{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_13076/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_13076","id":"gutenberg_13076","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/13076","summary":null,"tags":["Authors, English -- 19th century -- Biography","Category: Art","Category: Biographies","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Ruskin, John, 1819-1900"],"text":"THE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN\n\nby\n\nW. G. COLLINGWOOD\nM.A., F.S.A., Late Professor of Fine Art, University College, Reading\n\n1911\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE TO THE SEVENTH EDITION\n\n\nThis book in its first form was written nearly twenty years ago with the\nintention of contributing a volume to a series of University Extension\nManuals. For that purpose it included a sketch of Ruskin's \"Work,\" with\nsome attempt to describe the continuous development of his thought. It\nhad the advantage--and the disadvantage--of being written under his eye;\nthat is to say, he saw as much of it as his health allowed; and it\nreceived his general approval.\n\nTo explain my venturing upon the subject at all, I may perhaps be\nallowed to state that I became his pupil in 1872 (having seen him\nearlier), and continued to be in some relation to him--as visitor,\nresident assistant, or near neighbour--until his death.\n\nAfter his death the biographical part of my book was enlarged at the\nexpense of the description of his writings; and in revising once more I\nhave thrown out much relating to his works, chiefly because they are now\naccessible as they were not formerly.\n\nW.G.C.\n\nCONISTON, May 1911\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nBOOK I\n\nTHE BOY POET (1819-1842)\n\nCHAPTER\n    I. HIS ANCESTORS\n   II. THE FATHER OF THE MAN (1819-1825)\n  III. PERFERVIDUM INGENIUM (1826-1830)\n   IV. MOUNTAIN-WORSHIP (1830-1835)\n    V. THE GERM OF \"MODERN PAINTERS\" (1836)\n   VI. A LOVE-STORY (1836-1839)\n  VII. \"KATA PHUSIN\" (1837-1838)\n VIII. SIR ROGER NEWDIGATE'S PRIZE (1837-1839)\n   IX. \"THE BROKEN CHAIN\" (1840-1841)\n    X. THE GRADUATE OF OXFORD (1841-1842)\n\n\nBOOK II\n\nTHE ART CRITIC (1842-1860)\n\n    I. \"TURNER AND THE ANCIENTS\" (1842-1844)\n   II. CHRISTIAN ART (1845-1847)\n  III. \"THE SEVEN LAMPS\" (1847-1849)\n   IV. \"STONES OF VENICE\" (1849-1851)\n    V. PRE-RAPHAELITISM (1851-1853)\n   VI. THE EDINBURGH LECTURES (1853-1854)\n  VII. THE WORKING MEN'S COLLEGE (1854-1855)\n VIII. \"MODERN PAINTERS\" CONTINUED (1855-1856)\n   IX. \"THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ART\" (1857-1858)\n    X. \"MODERN PAINTERS\" CONCLUDED (1858-1860)\n\n\nBOOK III\n\nHERMIT AND HERETIC (1860-1870)\n\nCHAPTER\n\n   I. \"UNTO THIS LAST\" (1860-1861)\n  II. \"MUNERA PULVERIS\" (1862)\n III. THE LIMESTONE ALPS (1863)\n  IV. \"SESAME AND LILIES\" (1864)\n   V. \"ETHICS OF THE DUST\" (1865)\n  VI. \"THE CROWN OF WILD OLIVE\" (1865-1866)\n VII. \"TIME AND TIDE\" (1867)\nVIII. AGATES, AND ABBEVILLE (1868)\n  IX. \"THE QUEEN OF THE AIR\" (1869)\n   X. VERONA AND OXFORD (1869-1870)\n\n\nBOOK IV\n\nPROFESSOR AND PROPHET (1870-1900)\n\n   I. FIRST OXFORD LECTURES (1870-1871)\n  II. \"FORS\" BEGUN (1871-1872)\n III. OXFORD TEACHING (1872-1875)\n  IV. ST. GEORGE AND ST. MARK (1875-1877)\n   V. \"DEUCALION\" AND \"PROSERPINA\" (1877-1879)\n  VI. THE DIVERSIONS OF BRANTWOOD (1879-1881)\n VII. \"FORS\" RESUMED (1880-1881)\nVIII. THE RECALL TO OXFORD (1882-1883)\n  IX. THE STORM-CLOUD (1884-1888)\n   X. DATUR HORA QUIETI (1889-1900)\n\n\n\n\nTHE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN\n\n\nBOOK I\n\n\nTHE BOY POET (1819-1842)\n\n\n\n\nTHE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nHIS ANCESTORS\n\n\nIf origin, if early training and habits of life, if tastes, and\ncharacter, and associations, fix a man's nationality, then John Ruskin\nmust be reckoned a Scotsman. He was born in London, but his family was\nfrom Scotland. He was brought up in England, but the friends and\nteachers, the standards and influences of his early life, were chiefly\nScottish. The writers who directed him into the main lines of his\nthought and work were Scotsmen--from Sir Walter and Lord Lindsay and\nPrincipal Forbes to the master of his later studies of men and the means\nof life, Thomas Carlyle. The religious instinct so conspicuous in him\nwas a heritage from Scotland; thence the combination of shrewd\ncommon-sense and romantic sentiment; the oscillation between levity and\ndignity, from caustic jest to tender earnest; the restlessness, the\nfervour, the impetuosity--all these are the tokens of a Scotsman of\nparts, and were highly developed in John Ruskin.\n\nIn the days of auld lang syne the Rhynns of Galloway--that\nhammer-headed promontory of Scotland which looks towards Belfast\nLough--was the home of two great families, the Agnews and the Adairs.\nThe Agnews, of Norman race, occupied the northern half, centring about\ntheir island-fortress of Lochnaw, where they became celebrated for a\nlong line of hereditary sheriffs and baronets who have played no\ninconsiderable part in public affairs. The southern half, from\nPortpatrick to the Mull of Galloway, was held by the Adairs (or, as\nformerly spelt, Edzears) who took their name from Edgar, son of\nDovenald, one of the two Galloway leaders at the Battle of the Standard.\nThree hundred years later Robert Edzear--who does not know his\ndescendant and namesake, Robin Adair?--settled at Gainoch, near the head\nof Luce Bay; and for another space of 300 years his children kept the\nsame estate, in spite of private feud, and civil war, and religious\npersecution, of which they had more than their share.\n\nAt the beginning of the eighteenth century, John Adair, the laird of\nLittle Genoch, was married to Mary Agnew, a near kinswoman of the\ncelebrated Sir Andrew, colonel of the Scots Fusiliers at Dettingen. The\nexact relationship of Mary Agnew to \"the bravest man in the British\narmy\" remains undecided, but letters still extant from the Lady Agnew of\nthe day address her as \"Dear Molly,\" and end, \"Your affectionate cousin\"\nor \"kinswoman.\" Her son Thomas succeeded his father in 1721, and,\nretiring with his captaincy, settled on the estate. He married Jean,\ndaughter of Andrew Ross of Balsarroch and Balkail, a lady noted for her\nbeauty, her wit, and her Latin scholarship, and a member of a family\nwhich has given many distinguished men to the army and navy. Among them\nAdmiral Sir John Ross, the Arctic explorer, Sir Hew Dalrymple, and\nField-Marshal Sir Hew Dalrymple Ross, were all her great-nephews, and\nher son, Dr. John Adair, was the man in whose arms Wolfe died at the\ntaking of Quebec; it is he who is shown in Benjamin West's picture\nsupporting the General.\n\nDr. Adair's sister Catherine, the daughter of Thomas Adair and Jean\nRoss, married the Rev. James Tweddale, minister of Glenluce from 1758 to\n1778, representative of an old Covenanting family, and holder of the\noriginal Covenant, which had been confided to the care of his great-aunt\nCatherine by Baillie of Jarviswood on his way to execution in the\n\"killing time.\" The document was sold with his library at his death, his\nchildren being then under age, and is now in the Glasgow Museum. One of\nthese children, Catherine, married a John Ruskin.\n\nThe origin of the name of Ruskin is English, dating from the middle\nages. Soon after the dissolution of Furness Abbey, Richerde Ruskyn and\nhis family were land-owners at Dalton-in-Furness. One branch, and that\nwith which we are especially concerned, settled in Edinburgh.\n\nJohn Ruskin--our subject's grandfather--when he ran away with Catherine\nTweddale in 1781, was a handsome lad of twenty. His portrait as a child\nproves his looks, and he evidently had some charm of character or\npromise of power, for the escapade did not lose him the friendship of\nthe lady's family. Major Ross, her uncle and guardian, remained a good\nfriend to the young couple. She herself was only sixteen at her\nmarriage--a bright and animated brunette, as her miniature shows, in\nlater years ripening to a woman of uncommon strength, with old-fashioned\npiety of a robust, practical type, and a spirit which the trials of her\nafter-life--and they were many--could not subdue. Her husband set up in\nthe wine trade in Edinburgh. For many years they lived in the Old Town,\nthen a respectable neighbourhood, among a cultivated and well-bred\nsociety, in which they moved as equals, entertaining, with others, such\na man as Dr. Thomas Brown, the professor of philosophy, a great light in\nhis own day, and still conspicuous in the constellation of Scotch\nmetaphysicians.\n\n\n      JOHN ADAIR, = MARY, cousin of Sir Andrew Agnew, of Lochnaw,\nof Little Genoch. |       hereditary Sheriff of Wigtownshire.\n                  |\n                  |\n       Capt. Thomas Adair, = Jean Ross, of Balsarroch, great-aunt of Sir\n       of Little Genoch.   |             John Ross, the Arctic explorer,\n                           |             of Sir Hew Dalrymple, and of Sir\n                           |             Hew Dalrymple Ross.\n                           |\n   +-----------------------+============+\n   |                  |        |        |\n  Rev.  = Isobel     Dr.      Mrs.    Cath. =  Rev.      John\n Andrew  McDouall,  Adair,  Maitland  Adair | James     Ruskin\n Adair,     of       of      grand-         | Twaddle,  (1732-\nMinister  Logan     Quebec   mother         |   of       1780)\n   of                and       of           |  Glen-      |\nWhithorn            London    J.E.          |  luce       |\n                            Maitland        |             |\n                              of            |             |\n                            Kenmure         |             |\n                             Castle         |             |\n                                            |             |\n                          +---------+=======+  +==========+--------------+\n                          |         |          |      |                  |\n          Cath.      =  James     Cath.  =   John   Margt.  =   Capt.  Other\n        Mactaggart   | Tweddale, Tweddale|  Ruskin  Ruskin  |    Cox   issue\n         (aunt of    |   of      (1765-  |    of   (b. 1756)|     of\n         Sir John    |  Glen-    181[?]) | Edinburgh        |  Yarmouth\nJoseph  Mactaggart,  | laggan            |  (1761-          |   (1757-\nSevern  Bart., M.P., |                   |  1812[?])        |  1789[?])\n  of       of        |                   |                  |\n Rome    Ardwell)    |                   |                  |\n  |                  |                   |                  |\n+-+             +----+              +----+==+          +====+---+\n|               |    |              |       |          |        |\n|   George  = Cath.  |  Peter   = Jessie   J.J.   = Margaret  Bridget=  Mr.\n|   Agnew,  |Tweddale| Richard- | Ruskin  Ruskin, |   Cox       Cox  |Richard-\n|   hered-  |        |   son,   |           of    |  (1781-          |  son\n|   itary   |   +----+    of    |        Billiter |   1871)          |  of\n|  Sheriff- |   |      Bridgend,|         Street  |                  | Market\n|   clerk   | Other     Perth   |          and    |                  | Street,\n|    of     | isssue            |        Denmark  |                  | Croydon\n|  Wigtown  |                   |          Hill   |                  |\n|           |                   |        (1785-   |                  |\n|           |                   |         1864)   |                  |\n|           |                   |                 |                  |\n|           |                   |                 |                  |\n+-+------+  +-------+------+    +-+-+-+-+-+-+     |               +-+++-+-+-+\n  |      |          |      |    | | | | | | |     |               | | | | | |\nOther  Arthur  =  Joan   Other  James            John             John (d.\nissue  Severn, | Ruskin  issue   (d. young),    Ruskin             in\n        R.I.,  |  Agnew         John, of       (b. 1819)           Australia),\n         of    |                 Glasgow,                         William\n       Hearne  |                William, M.D.,                    George (of\n        Hill   |                 (Tunbridge                        Croydon)\n               |                  Wells),                         Charles\n          +-+-+++-+             Andrew (d. in                      (drowned\n          | | | | |               Australia),                       1834)\n           Lily                 Catherine                         Margaret\n           Arthur                (d. young),                      Bridget\n           Agnew                Margaret and\n           Violet               Peter\n           Herbert               (d. young)\n                                Mary\n                                 (1815-1849),\n                                Jessie\n                                 (1818-1827)\n\n\nTheir son, John James Ruskin (born May 10, 1785), was sent to the\nfamous High School of Edinburgh, under Dr. Adam, the most renowned of\nScottish head-masters, and there he received the sound old-fashioned\nclassical education. Before he was sixteen, his sister Jessie was\nalready married at Perth to Peter Richardson, a tanner living at Bridge\nEnd, by the Tay; and so his cousin, Margaret Cox, was sent for to fill\nthe vacant place.\n\nShe was a daughter of old Mr. Ruskin's sister, who had married a Captain\nCox, sailing from Yarmouth for the herring fishery. He had died in 1789,\nor thereabouts, from the results of an accident while riding homewards\nto his family after one of his voyages, and his widow maintained herself\nin comfort by keeping the old King's Head Inn at Croydon Market-place.\nOf her two daughters the younger married another Mr. Richardson, a baker\nat Croydon, so that, by an odd coincidence, there were two families of\nRichardsons, unconnected with one another except through their\nrelationship to the Ruskins.\n\nMargaret, the elder daughter, who came to keep house for her uncle in\nEdinburgh, was then nearly twenty years of age. She had been the model\npupil at her Croydon day-school; tall and handsome, pious and practical,\nshe was just the girl to become the confidante and adviser of her\ndark-eyed, active, and romantic young cousin.\n\nSome time before the beginning of 1807, John James, having finished his\neducation at the High School, went to London, where a place had been\nfound for him by his uncle's brother-in-law, Mr. MacTaggart. He was\nfollowed by a kind letter from Dr. Thomas Brown, who advised him to keep\nup his Latin, and to study political economy, for the Professor looked\nupon him as a young man of unusual promise and power. During some two\nyears, he worked as a clerk in the house of Sir William Gordon, Murphy\nand Co., where he made friends, and laid the foundation of his\nprosperity; for along with him at the office there was a Mr. Peter\nDomecq, owner of the Spanish vineyards of Macharnudo, learning the\ncommercial part of his business in London, the headquarters of the\nsherry trade. He admired his fellow-clerk's capacity so much as to offer\nhim the London agency of his family business. Mr. MacTaggart found the\ncapital in consideration of their taking his relative, Mr. Telford, into\nthe concern. And so they entered into partnership, about 1809, as\nRuskin, Telford and Domecq: Domecq contributing the sherry, Mr. Henry\nTelford the capital, and Ruskin the brains.\n\nHow he came by his business capacity may be understood--and in some\nmeasure, perhaps, how his son came by his flexible and forcible\nstyle--from a letter of Mrs. Catherine Ruskin, written about this time;\nin which, moreover, there are a few details of family circumstances and\ncharacter, not without interest. John James Ruskin had been protesting\nthat he was never going to marry, but meant to devote himself to his\nmother; she replied:\n\n\n     \"... But my son an old Batchelor--believe me my beloved Child I\n     feel the full force and value of that affection that could prompt\n     to such a plan--dear as your society is to me it would then become\n     the misery of my existence--could I see my Child so formed for\n     domestick happiness deprived of every blessing on my account. No my\n     Dr John I do not know a more unhappy being than an old Batchelor\n     ... may God preserve my Child from realizing the dreary picture--as\n     soon as you can keep a Wife you must Marry with all possible\n     speed--that is as soon as you find a very Amiable woman. She must\n     be a good daughter and fond of Domestick life--and pious, without\n     ostentation, for remember no Woman without the fear of God, can\n     either make a good Wife or a good Mother--freethinking Men are\n     shocking to nature, but from an Infidel Woman Good Lord deliver us.\n     I have thought more of it than you have done--for I have two or\n     three presents carefully [laid] by for her, and I have also been so\n     foresightly as to purchase two Dutch toys for your Children in case\n     you might marry before we had free intercourse with that\n     country.... Who can say what I can say 'here is my Son--a hansome\n     accomplished young man of three and twenty--he will not Marry that\n     he may take care of his Mother--here is my Dr Margaret, hansome,\n     Amiable and good and she would not leave her _Ant_ (I mean Aunt)\n     for any Man on Earth.' Ah My Dear and valuable children, dear is\n     your affection to my heart, but I will never make so base a use of\n     it. I entreat my Dr John that you will not give yourself one\n     moment's uneasiness about me--I will at all events have \u00a386 a year\n     for life that your Father cannot deprive me of, and tho' I could\n     not live very splendidly in a Town on this, yet with a neat little\n     House and Garden in the country, it would afford all the means of\n     life in fullness to Meggy myself and our servant. You forget, my Dr\n     how much a woman can do without in domestick affairs to save\n     Money--a Woman that has any management at all can live with more\n     comfort on \u00a350 a year than a Man could do on two hundred. There was\n     a year of my life that I maintained myself and two children on\n     twenty pound, the bread too was 1/2 the loave that year: we did not\n     indeed live very sumptuously nor shall I say our strength improved\n     much but I did not contract one farthing of debt and that to me\n     supplyed the want of luxuries. Now my Dr John let me never hear a\n     fear expressed on my account; there is no fear of me; make yourself\n     happy and all will be well, and for God sake my beloved Boy take\n     care of your health, take a good drink of porter to dinner and\n     supper and a little Wine now and then, and tell me particularly\n     about yr new Lodgings,\" etc.\n\nHe returned home to Edinburgh on a visit and arranged a marriage with\nhis cousin Margaret, if she would wait for him until he was safely\nestablished; and then he set to work at the responsibilities of creating\na new business. It was a severer task than he had anticipated, for his\nfather's brain and business, as the above letter hints, had both gone\nwrong; he left Edinburgh and settled at Bower's Well, Perth, ended\ntragically, and left a load of debt behind him, which the son, sensitive\nto the family honour, undertook to pay before laying by a penny for\nhimself. It took nine years of assiduous labour and economy. He worked\nthe business entirely by himself. The various departments that most men\nentrust to others he filled in person. He managed the correspondence,\nhe travelled for orders, he arranged the importation, he directed the\ngrowers out in Spain, and gradually built up a great business, paid off\nhis father's creditors, and secured his own competence.\n\nThis was not done without sacrifice of health, which he never recovered,\nnor without forming habits of over-anxiety and toilsome minuteness which\nlasted his life long. But his business cares were relieved by cultured\ntastes. He loved art, painted in water-colours in the old style, and\nknew a good picture when he saw it. He loved literature, and read aloud\nfinely all the old standard authors, though he was not too old-fashioned\nto admire \"Pickwick\" and the \"Noctes Ambrosian\u00e6\" when they appeared. He\nloved the scenery and architecture among which he had travelled in\nScotland and Spain; but he could find interest in almost any place and\nany subject; an alert man, in whom practical judgment was joined to a\nromantic temperament, strong feelings and opinions to extended\nsympathies. His letters, of which there are many preserved, bear witness\nto his character, taste, and intellect, curiously anticipating, on some\npoints, those of his son. His portraits give the idea of an expressive\nface, sensitive, refined, every feature a gentleman's.\n\nSo, after those nine years of work and waiting, he went to Perth to\nclaim his cousin's hand. She was for further delay; but with the\nminister's help he persuaded her one evening into a prompt marriage in\nthe Scotch fashion, drove off with her next morning to Edinburgh, and on\nto the home he had prepared in London at 54, Hunter Street, Brunswick\nSquare (February 27, 1818).\n\nThe heroine of this little drama was no ordinary bride. At Edinburgh she\nhad found herself, though well brought up for Croydon, inferior to the\nsociety of the Modern Athens. As the affianced of a man of ability, she\nfelt it her duty to make herself his match in mental culture, as she was\nalready in her own department of practical matters. Under Dr. Brown's\ndirection, and stimulated by his notice, she soon became--not a\nblue-stocking--but well-read, well-informed above the average. She was\none of those persons who set themselves a very high standard, and\nresolve to drag both themselves and their neighbours up to it. But, as\nthe process is difficult, so it is disappointing. People became rather\nshy of Mrs. Ruskin, and she of them, so that her life was solitary and\nher household quiet. It was not merely from narrow Puritanism that she\nmade so few friends; her morality and her piety, strict as they were\nwithin their own lines, permitted her most of the enjoyments and\namusements of life; still less was there any cynicism or misanthropy.\nBut she devoted herself to her husband and son. She was too proud to\ncourt those above her in worldly rank, and she was not easily approached\nexcept by people fully equal to her in strength of character, of whom\nthere could never be many. The few who made their way to her friendship\nfound her a true and valuable friend.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE FATHER OF THE MAN (1819-1825)\n\n\nInto this family John Ruskin was born on February 8, 1819, at half-past\nseven in the morning. He was baptised on the twentieth by the Rev. Mr.\nBoyd.\n\nThe first account of him in writing is in a letter from his mother when\nhe was six weeks old. She chronicles--not without a touch of\nsuperstition--the breaking of a looking-glass, and continues: \"John\ngrows finely; he is just now on my knees sleeping and looking so\nsweetly; I hope I shall not get proud of him.\" He was a fine healthy\nbaby, and at four months was \"beginning to give more decided proofs that\nhe knows what he wants, and will have it if crying and passion will get\nit.\" At a year his mother resolves that \"this will be cured by a good\nwhipping when he can understand what it is,\" and we know that she\ncarried out her Spartan resolve.\n\nThis, and the story in \"Arachne,\" how she let him touch the tea-kettle;\nand the reminiscences in \"Pr\u00e6terita\" of playthings locked up, and a lone\nlittle boy staring at the water-cart and the pattern on the carpet--all\nthese give a gloomy impression of his mother, against which we must set\nthe proofs of affection and kindliness shown in her letters. In these we\ncan see her anxiously nursing him through childish ailments, taking him\nout for his daily walk to Duppas Hill with a captain's biscuit in her\nmuff, for fear he should be hungry by the way; we hear her teaching him\nhis first lessons, with astonishment at his wonderful memory, and\nglorying with Nurse Anne over his behaviour in church; and all these\nthings she retails in gossiping letters to her husband, while Mr.\nRichard Gray gives two-year-old John \"his first lesson on the flute,\nboth sitting on the drawing-room floor, very deeply engaged.\" \"I am\nsure,\" she says, \"there is no other love, no other feeling, like a\nmother's towards her first boy when she loves his father;\" and her pride\nin his looks, and precocity, and docility--\"I never met with a child of\nhis age so sensible to praise or blame\"--found a justification in his\npassionate devotion to the man who was so dear to them both.\n\nThough he was born in the thick of London, he was not City-bred. His\nfirst three summers were spent in lodgings in Hampstead or Dulwich, then\n\"the country.\" So early as his fourth summer he was taken to Scotland by\nsea to stay with his aunt Jessie, Mrs. Richardson of Perth. There he\nfound cousins to play with, especially one, little Jessie, of nearly his\nown age; he found a river with deep swirling pools, that impressed him\nmore than the sea, and he found the mountains. Coming home in the\nautumn, he sat for his full-length portrait to James Northcote, R.A.,\nand being asked what he would choose for background, he replied, \"Blue\nhills.\"\n\nNorthcote had painted Mr. and Mrs. Ruskin, and, as they were fond of\nartistic company, remained their friend. A certain friendship too, was\nstruck up between the old Academician, then in his seventy-seventh year,\nthe acknowledged cynic and satirist, and the little wise boy who asked\nshrewd questions, and could sit still to be painted; who, moreover, had\na face worth painting, not unlike the model from whom Northcote's\nmaster, the great Sir Joshua, had painted his famous cherubs. The\npainter asked him to come again, and sit as the hero of a fancy picture,\nbought at the Academy by the flattered parents. There is a grove, a\nflock of toy sheep, drapery in the grand style, a mahogany Satyr taking\na thorn out of the little pink foot of a conventional nudity--poor\nsurvivals of the Titianesque. But the head is an obvious portrait, and a\nhappy one; far more like the real boy, so tradition says, than the\ngeneralized chubbiness of the commissioned picture.\n\nIn the next year (1823) they quitted the town for a suburban home. The\nspot they chose was in rural Dulwich, on Herne Hill, a long offshoot of\nthe Surrey downs; low, and yet commanding green fields and scattered\nhouses in the foreground, with rich undulating country to the south, and\nlooking across London toward Windsor and Harrow. It is all built up now;\nbut their house (later No. 28) must have been as secluded as any in a\ncountry village. There were ample gardens front and rear, well stocked\nwith fruit and flowers--quite an Eden for a little boy, and all the more\nthat the fruit of it was forbidden. It was here that all his years of\nyouth were spent. Here, under his parents' roof, he wrote his earlier\nworks, as far as vol. i. of \"Modern Painters.\" To the adjoining house,\nas his own separate home, he returned for a period of his middle life;\nand in the old home, handed over to his adopted daughter, he still used\nto find his own rooms ready when he cared to visit London.\n\nSo he was brought up almost as a country boy, though near enough to town\nto get the benefit of it, and far enough from the more exciting scenes\nof landscape nature to find them ever fresh, when summer after summer he\nrevisited the river scenery of the West or the mountains of the North.\nFor by a neat arrangement, and one fortunate for his education, the\nsummer tours were continued yearly. Mr. John James Ruskin still\ntravelled for the business, then greatly extending. \"Strange,\" he writes\non one occasion, \"that Watson [his right-hand man] went this journey\nwithout getting one order, and everyone gives me an order directly.\" In\nreturn for these services to the firm, Mr. Telford, the capitalist\npartner, took the vacant chair at the office, and even lent his carriage\nfor the journeys. There was room for two, so Mrs. Ruskin accompanied her\nhusband, whose indifferent health gave her and his friends constant\nanxiety during long separations. And the boy could easily be packed in,\nsitting on his little portmanteau, and playing horses with his father's\nknees; the nurse riding on the dickey behind.\n\nThey started usually after the great family anniversary, the father's\nbirthday, on May 10, and journeyed by easy stages through the South of\nEngland, working up the west to the north, and then home by the\neast-central route, zigzagging from one provincial town to another,\ncalling at the great country seats, to leave no customer or possible\ncustomer unvisited; and in the intervals of business seeing all the\nsights of the places they passed through--colleges and churches,\ngalleries and parks, ruins, castles, caves, lakes, and mountains--and\nseeing them all, not listlessly, but with keen interest, noting\neverything, inquiring for local information, looking up books of\nreference, setting down the results, as if they had been meaning to\nwrite a guide-book and gazetteer of Great Britain. _They_, I say, did\nall this, for as soon as the boy could write, he was only imitating his\nfather in keeping his little journal of the tours, so that all he\nlearned stayed by him, and the habit of descriptive writing was formed.\n\nIn 1823 they seem to have travelled only through the south and\nsouth-west; in 1824 they pushed north to the lakes, stayed awhile at\nKeswick, and while the father went about his business, the child was\nrambling with his nurse on Friar's Crag, among the steep rocks and\ngnarled roots, which suggested, even at that age, the feelings expressed\nin one of the notable passages in \"Modern Painters.\" Thence they went on\nto Scotland, and revisited their relatives at Perth. In 1825 they took a\nmore extended tour, and spent a few weeks in Paris, partly for the\nfestivities at the coronation of Charles X., partly for business\nconference with Mr. Domecq, who had just been appointed wine-merchant to\nthe King of Spain. Thence they went to Brussels and the field of\nWaterloo, of greater interest than the sights of Paris to six-year-old\nJohn, who often during his boyhood celebrated the battle, and the heroes\nof the battle, in verse.\n\nBefore he was quite three he used to climb into a chair and preach.\nThere is nothing so uncommon in that. Of Robert Browning, his neighbour\nand seven-years-older contemporary, the same tale is told. But while the\nincident that marks the baby Browning is the aside, _\u00e0 propos_ of a\nwhimpering sister, \"Pew-opener, remove that child,\" the baby Ruskin is\nseen in his sermon: \"People, be dood. If you are dood, Dod will love\nyou; if you are not dood, Dod will not love you. People, be dood.\"\n\nAt the age of four he had begun to read and write, refusing to be taught\nin the orthodox way--this is so accurately characteristic--by syllabic\nspelling and copy-book pothooks. He preferred to find a method out for\nhimself, and he found out how to read whole words at a time by the look\nof them, and to write in vertical characters like book-print, just as\nthe latest improved theories of education suggest. His first letter may\nbe quoted as illustrating his own account of his childhood, and as\nproving how entirely Scotch was the atmosphere in which he was brought\nup. The postmark gives the date March 15, 1823. Mrs. Ruskin premises\nthat John was scribbling on a paper from which he proceeded to read what\nshe writes down (I omit certain details about the whip):\n\n\n     \"MY DEAR PAPA,\n\n     \"I love you. I have got new things. Waterloo Bridge--Aunt Bridget\n     brought me it. John and Aunt helped to put it up, but the pillars\n     they did not put right, upside down. Instead of a book bring me a\n     whip, coloured red and black.... To-morrow is Sabbath. Tuesday I go\n     to Croydon. I am going to take my boats and my ship to Croydon.\n     I'll sail them on the pond near the burn which the bridge is over.\n     I will be very glad to see my cousins. I was very happy when I saw\n     Aunt come from Croydon. I love Mrs. Gray and I love Mr. Gray. I\n     would like you to come home, and my kiss and my love.\"\n\n     [First autograph in straggling capitals]\n\n     \"JOHN RUSKIN\"\n\nWhen once he could read, thenceforward his mother gave him regular\nmorning lessons in Bible-reading and in reciting the Scotch paraphrases\nof the Psalms and other verse, which for his good memory was an easy\ntask. He made rhymes before he could write them, of course.\n\nAt five he was a bookworm, and the books he read fixed him in certain\ngrooves of thought, or, rather, say they were chosen as favourites from\nan especial interest in their subjects--an interest which arose from his\ncharacter of mind, and displayed it. But with all this precocity, he was\nno milksop or weakling; he was a bright, active lad, full of fun and\npranks, not without companions, though solitary when at home, and kept\nprecisely, in the hope of guarding him from every danger. He was so\nlittle afraid of animals--a great test of a child's nerves--that about\nthis time he must needs meddle with their fierce Newfoundland dog,\nLion, which bit him in the mouth, and spoiled his looks. Another time he\nshowed some address in extricating himself from the water-butt--a common\nchild-trap. He did not fear ghosts or thunder; instead of that, his\nearly-developed landscape feeling showed itself in dread of foxglove\ndells and dark pools of water, in coiling roots of trees--things that to\nthe average English fancy have no significance whatever.\n\nAt seven he began to imitate the books he was reading, to write books\nhimself. He had found out how to _print_, as children do; and it was his\nambition to make real books, with title-pages and illustrations, not\nonly books, indeed, but sets of volumes, a complete library of his whole\nworks. But in a letter of March 4, 1829, his mother says to his father:\n\"If you think of writing John, would you impress on him the propriety of\nnot beginning too eagerly and becoming careless towards the end of his\n_works_, as he calls them? I think in a letter from you it would have\ngreat weight. He is never idle, and he is even uncommonly persevering\nfor a child of his age; but he often spoils a good beginning by not\ntaking the trouble to think, and concluding in a hurry.\"\n\nThe first of these sets was imitated in style from Miss Edgeworth; he\ncalled it, \"Harry and Lucy Concluded; or, Early Lessons.\" Didactic he\nwas from the beginning. It was to be in four volumes, uniform in red\nleather, with proper title, frontispiece, and \"copper-plates,\" \"printed\nand composed by a little boy, and also drawn.\" It was begun in 1826, and\ncontinued at intervals until 1829. It was all done laboriously in\nimitation of print, and, to complete the illusion, contained a page of\nerrata. This great work was, of course, never completed, though he\nlaboured through three volumes; but when he tired of it, he would turn\nhis book upside down, and begin at the other end with other matters; so\nthat the red books contain all sorts of notes on his minerals and\ntravels, reports of sermons, and miscellaneous information, besides\ntheir professed contents; in this respect also being very like his later\nworks.\n\nThere you have our author ready made, with his ever-fresh interest in\neverything, and all-attempting eagerness, out of which the first thing\nthat crystallizes into any definite shape is the verse-writing.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nPERFERVIDUM INGENIUM (1826-1830)\n\n\nThe first dated \"poem\" was written a month before little John Ruskin\nreached the age of seven. It is a tale of a mouse, in seven octosyllabic\ncouplets, \"The Needless Alarm,\" remarkable only for an unexpected\ncorrectness in rhyme, rhythm, and reason.\n\nHis early verse owes much to the summer tours, which were prolific in\nnotes; everything was observed and turned into verse. The other\ninspiring source was his father--the household deity of both wife and\nchild, whose chief delight was in his daily return from the city, and in\nhis reading to them in the drawing-room at Herne Hill. John was packed\ninto a recess, where he was out of the way and the draught; he was\nbarricaded by a little table that held his own materials for amusement,\nand if he liked to listen to the reading, he had the chance of hearing\ngood literature, the chance sometimes of hearing passages from Byron and\nChristopher North and Cervantes, rather beyond his comprehension, for\nhis parents were not of the shockable sort: with all their religion and\nstrict Scotch morality, they could laugh at a broad jest, as\nold-fashioned people could.\n\nSo he associated his father and his father's readings with the poetry\nof reflection, as he associated the regular summer round with the poetry\nof description. As every summer brought its crop of description, so\nagainst the New Year (for, being Scotch, they did not then keep our\nChristmas) and against his father's birthday in May he used always to\nprepare some little drama or story or \"address\" of a reflective nature,\nbeginning with the verses on \"Time,\" written for New Year's Day, 1827.\n\nThat year they were again at Perth, and on their way home some early\nmorning frost suggested the not ungraceful verses on the icicles at\nGlenfarg. By a childish misconception, the little boy seems to have\nconfused the real valley that interested him so with Scott's ideal\nGlendearg, and, partly for this reason, to have found a greater pleasure\nin \"The Monastery,\" which he thereupon undertook to paraphrase in verse.\nThere remain some hundreds of doggerel rhymes; but his affection for\nthat particular novel survived the fatal facility of his octosyllabics,\nand reappears time after time in his later writings.\n\nNext year, 1828, their tour was stopped at Plymouth by the painful news\nof the death of his aunt Jessie, to whom they were on their way. It was\nhardly a year since the bright little cousin, Jessie of Perth, had died\nof water on the brain. She had been John's especial pet and playfellow,\nclever, like him, and precocious; and her death must have come to his\nparents as a warning, if they needed it, to keep their own child's brain\nfrom over-pressure. It is evident that they did their best to \"keep him\nback\"; they did not send him to school for fear of the excitement of\ncompetitive study. His mother put him through the Latin grammar herself,\nusing the old Adam's manual which his father had used at Edinburgh High\nSchool. Even this old grammar became a sort of sacred book to him; and\nwhen at last he went to school, and his English master threw the book\nback to him, saying, \"that's a Scotch thing,\" the boy was shocked and\naffronted, as which of us would be at a criticism on _our_ first\ninstrument of torture? He remembered the incident all his life, and\npilloried the want of tact with acerbity in his reminiscences.\n\nThey could keep him from school, but they did not keep him from study.\nThe year 1828 saw the beginning of another great work, \"Eudosia, a Poem\non the Universe\"; it was \"printed\" with even greater neatness and\nlabour; but this, too, after being toiled at during the winter months,\nwas dropped in the middle of its second \"book.\" It was not idleness that\nmade him break off such plans, but just the reverse--a too great\nactivity of brain. His parents seem to have thought that there was no\nharm in this apparently quiet reading and writing. They were extremely\nenergetic themselves, and hated idleness. They appear to have held a\ntheory that their little boy was safe so long as he was not obviously\nexcited; and to have thought that the proper way of giving children\npocket-money was to let them earn it. So they used to pay him for his\nliterary labours; \"Homer\" was one shilling a page; \"Composition,\" one\npenny for twenty lines; \"Mineralogy,\" one penny an article.\n\nThe death of his aunt Jessie left a large family of boys and one girl to\nthe care of their widowed father, and the Ruskins felt it their duty to\nhelp. They fetched Mary Richardson away, and brought her up as a sister\nto their solitary son. She was not so beloved as Jessie had been, but a\ngood girl and a nice girl, four years older than John, and able to be a\ncompanion to him in his lessons and travels. There was no sentimentality\nabout his attachment to her, but a steady fraternal relationship, he, of\ncourse, being the little lord and master; but she was not without\nspirit, which enabled her to hold her own, and perseverance, which\nsometimes helped her to eclipse, for the moment, his brilliancy. They\nlearnt together, wrote their journals together, and shared alike with\nthe scrupulous fairness which Mrs. Ruskin's sensible nature felt called\non to show. And so she remained his sister, and not quite his sister,\nuntil she married, and after a very short married life died.\n\nAnother accession to the family took place in the same year (1828); the\nCroydon aunt, too, had died, and left a dear dog, Dash, a brown and\nwhite spaniel, which at first refused to leave her coffin, but was\ncoaxed away, and found a happy home at Herne Hill, and frequent\ncelebration in his young master's verses. So the family was now\ncomplete--papa and mamma, Mary and John and Dash. One other figure must\nnot be forgotten, Nurse Anne, who had come from the Edinburgh home, and\nremained always with them, John's nurse and then Mrs. Ruskin's\nattendant, as devoted and as censorious as any old-style Scotch servant\nin a story-book.\n\nThe year 1829 marked an advance in poetical composition. For his\nfather's birthday he made a book more elaborate than any, sixteen pages\nin a red cover, with a title-page quite like print: \"Battle of Waterloo\n| a play | in two acts | with other small | Poems dedicated to his\nfather | by John Ruskin | 1829 Hernhill _(sic)_ Dulwich.\"\n\nTo this are appended, among other pieces, fair copies of \"Skiddaw,\" and\n\"Derwentwater.\" A recast of these, touched up by some older hand, and\nprinted in _The Spiritual Times_ for February, 1830, may be called his\nfirst appearance in type.\n\nAn illness of his postponed their tour for 1829, until it was too late\nfor more than a little journey in Kent. He has referred his earliest\nsketching to this occasion, but it seems likely that the drawings\nattributed to this year were done in 1831. He was, however, busy writing\npoetry. At Tunbridge, for example, he wrote that fragment \"On Happiness\"\nwhich catches so cleverly the tones of Young--a writer whose orthodox\nmoralizing suited with the creed in which John Ruskin was brought up,\nalternating, be it remembered, with \"Don Quixote.\"\n\nComing home, he began a new edition of his verses, on a more\npretentious scale than the old red books, in a fine bound volume,\nexquisitely \"printed,\" with the poems dated. This new energy seems to\nhave been roused by the gift from his Croydon cousin Charles, a clerk in\nthe publishing house of Smith, Elder, and Co., of their annual\n\"Friendship's Offering.\" Mrs. Ruskin, in a letter of October 31, 1829,\nfinds \"the poetry very so-so\"; but John evidently made the book his\nmodel.\n\nHe was now growing out of his mother's tutorship, and during this autumn\nhe was put under the care of Dr. Andrews for his Latin. He relates the\nintroduction in \"Pr\u00e6terita,\" and, more circumstantially, in a letter of\nthe time, to Mrs. Monro, the mother of his charming Mrs. Richard Gray,\nthe indulgent neighbour who used to pamper the little gourmand with\ndelicacies unknown in severe Mrs. Ruskin's dining-room. He says in the\nletter--this is at ten years old: \"Well, papa, seeing how fond I was of\nthe doctor, and knowing him to be an excellent Latin scholar, got him\nfor me as a tutor, and every lesson I get I like him better and better,\nfor he makes me laugh 'almost, if not quite'--to use one of his own\nexpressions--the whole time. He is so funny, comparing Neptune's lifting\nup the wrecked ships of \u00c6neas with his trident to my lifting up a potato\nwith a fork, or taking a piece of bread out of a bowl of milk with a\nspoon! And as he is always saying [things] of that kind, or relating\nsome droll anecdote, or explaining the part of Virgil (the book which I\nam in) very nicely, I am always delighted when Mondays, Wednesdays, and\nFridays are come.\"\n\nDr. Andrews was no doubt a genial teacher, and had been a scholar of\nsome distinction in his University of Glasgow; but Mrs. Ruskin thought\nhim \"flighty,\" as well she might, when, after six months' Greek, he\nproposed (in March, 1831) to begin Hebrew with John. It was a great\nmisfortune for the young genius that he was not more sternly drilled at\nthe outset, and he suffered for it through many a long year of\nstruggles with deficient scholarship.\n\nThe Doctor had a large family and pretty daughters. One, who wrote\nverses in John's note-book, and sang \"Tambourgi,\" Mrs. Orme, lived until\n1892 in Bedford Park; the other lives in Coventry Patmore's \"Angel in\nthe House.\" When Ruskin, thirty years later, wrote of that\ndoubtfully-received poem, that it was the \"sweetest analysis we possess\nof quiet, modern, domestic feeling,\" few of his readers could have known\nall the grounds of his appreciation, or suspected the weight of meaning\nin the words.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nMOUNTAIN-WORSHIP (1830-1835)\n\n\nCritics who are least disposed to give Ruskin credit for his artistic\ndoctrines or economical theories unite in allowing that he taught his\ngeneration to look at Nature, and especially at the sublime in\nNature--at storms and sunrises, and the forests and snows of the Alps.\nThis mission of mountain-worship was the outcome of a passion beside\nwhich the other interests and occupations of his youth were only toys.\nHe could take up his mineralogy and his moralizing and lay them down,\nbut the love of mountain scenery was something beyond his control. We\nhave seen him leave his heart in the Highlands at three years old; we\nhave now to follow his passionate pilgrimages to Skiddaw and Snowdon, to\nthe Jungfrau and Mont Blanc.\n\nThey had planned a great tour through the Lakes and the North two years\nbefore, but were stopped at Plymouth by the news of Mrs. Richardson's\ndeath. At last the plan was carried out. A prose diary was written\nalternately by John and Mary, one carrying it on when the other tired,\nwith rather curious effect of unequally-yoked collaboration. We read how\nthey \"set off from London at seven o'clock on Tuesday morning, the 18th\nMay,\" and thenceforward we are spared no detail: the furniture of the\ninns; the bills of fare; when they got out of the carriage and walked;\nhow they lost their luggage; what they thought of colleges and chapels,\nmusic and May races at Oxford, of Shakespeare's tomb, and the\npin-factory at Birmingham; we have a complete guide-book to Blenheim and\nWarwick Castle, to Haddon and Chatsworth, and the full itinerary of\nDerbyshire. \"Matlock Bath,\" we read, \"is a most delightful place\"; but\nafter an enthusiastic description of High Tor, John reacts into bathos\nwith a minute description of wetting their shoes in a puddle. The cavern\nwith a Bengal light was fairyland to him, and among the minerals he was\nquite at home.\n\nThen they hurried north to Windermere. Once at Lowwood, the excitement\nthickens, with storms and rainbows, mountains and waterfalls, boats on\nthe lake and coaching on the steep roads. This journey through Lakeland\nis described in the galloping anap\u00e6sts of the \"Iteriad,\" which was\nsimply the prose journal versified on his return, one of the few\nenterprises of the sort which were really completed.\n\nTo readers who know the country it is interesting as giving a detailed\naccount in the days when this \"nook of English ground\" was \"secure from\nrash assault.\" One learns that, even then, there were jarring sights at\nBowness Bay and along Derwentwater shore, elements unkind and bills\nexorbitant. Coniston especially was dreary with rain, and its inn--the\nold Waterhead, now destroyed--extravagantly dear; \"_but_,\" says John,\nwith his eye for mineral specimens, \"it contains several rich\ncoppermines.\" An interesting touch is the hero-worship with which they\nwent reverently to peep at Southey and Wordsworth in church; too humble\nto dream of an introduction, and too polite to besiege the poets in\ntheir homes, but independent enough to form their own opinions on the\npersonality of the heroes. They did not like the look of Wordsworth at\nall; Southey they adored. The dominant note of the tour is, however, an\necstatic delight in the mountain scenery; on Skiddaw and Helvellyn all\nthe gamut of admiration is lavished.\n\nOn returning home, John began Greek under Dr. Andrews, and was soon\nversifying Anacreontics in his notebooks. He began to read Byron for\nhimself, with what result we shall see before long; but the most\nimportant new departure was the attempt to copy Cruikshank's etchings to\nGrimm's fairy tales, his real beginning at art. From this practice he\nlearnt the value of the pure, clean line that expresses form. It is a\ngood instance of the authority of these early years over Ruskin's whole\nlife and teaching that in his \"Elements of Drawing\" he advised young\nartists to begin with Cruikshank, as he began, and that he wrote\nappreciatively both of the stories and the etchings so many decades\nafterwards in the preface to a reprint by J.C. Hotten.\n\nHis cousin-sister Mary had been sent to a day-school when Mrs. Ruskin's\nlessons were superseded by Dr. Andrews, and she had learnt enough\ndrawing to attempt a view of the hotel at Matlock, a thing which John\ncould not do. So, now that he too showed some power of neat\ndraughtsmanship, it was felt that he ought to have her advantages. They\ngot Mr. Runciman the drawing-master, chosen, it may be, as a relative of\nthe well-known Edinburgh artist of the same name, to give him lessons,\nin the early part of 1831. His teaching was of the kind which preceded\nthe Hardingesque: it aimed at a bold use of the soft pencil, with a\ncertain roundness of composition and richness of texture, a conventional\n\"right way\" of drawing anything. This was hardly what John wanted; but,\nnot to be beaten, he facsimiled the master's freehand in a sort of\nengraver's stipple, which his habitual neatness helped him to do in\nperfection. Runciman soon put a stop to that, and took pains with a\npupil who took such pains with himself--taught him, at any rate, the\nprinciples of perspective, and remained his only drawing-master for\nseveral years.\n\nA sample of John Ruskin's early lessons in drawing, described by him in\nletters to his father, may be not without interest. On February 20,\n1832, he writes:\n\n\n     \"... You saw the two models that were last sent, before you went\n     away. Well, I took my paper, and I fixed my points, and I drew my\n     perspective, and then, as Mr. Runciman told me, I began to invent a\n     scene. You remember the cottage that we saw as we went to Rhaidyr\n     Dhu (_sic_), near Maentwrog, where the old woman lived whose\n     grandson went with us to the fall, so very silently? I thought my\n     model resembled that; so I drew a tree--such a tree, such an\n     enormous fellow--and I sketched the waterfall, with its dark rocks,\n     and its luxuriant wood, and its high mountains; and then I examined\n     one of Mary's pictures to see how the rocks were done, and another\n     to see how the woods were done, and another to see how the\n     mountains were done, and another to see how the cottages were done,\n     and I patched them all together, and I made such a lovely\n     scene--oh, I should get such a scold from Mr. Runciman (that is, if\n     he ever scolded)!\"\n\nAfter the next lesson he wrote, February 27, 1832:\n\n\n     \"You know the beautiful model drawing that I gave you an account of\n     in my last. I showed it to Mr. Runciman. He contemplated it for a\n     moment in silence, and then, turning, asked me if I had copied. I\n     told him how I had patched it up; but he said that that was not\n     copying, and although he was not satisfied with the picture, he\n     said there was something in it that would make him totally change\n     the method he had hitherto pursued with me. He then asked Mary for\n     some gray paper, which was produced; then inquired if I had a\n     colour-box; I produced the one you gave me, and he then told me he\n     should begin with a few of the simplest colours, in order to teach\n     me better the effects of light and shade. He should then proceed\n     to teach me water-colour painting, but the latter only as a basis\n     for oil; this last, however, to use his own words, all in due\n     time.... Oh, if I could paint well before we went to Dover! I\n     should have such sea-pieces....\"\n\nIn March 1834, Runciman was encouraging him in his oil-painting; but a\nyear later he wrote to his father:\n\n    \"I cannot bear to paint in oil,\n    C. Fielding's tints alone for me!\n    The other costs me double toil,\n    And wants some fifty coats to be\n    Splashed on each spot successively.\n    Faugh, wie es stinckt! I can't bring out,\n    With all, a picture fit to see.\n    My bladders burst; my oils are out--\n    And then, what's all the work about?\"\n\nAfter a few lessons he could rival Mary when they went for their summer\nexcursion. He set to work at once at Sevenoaks to draw cottages; at\nDover and Battle he attempted castles. It may be that these first\nsketches are of the pre-Runciman period; but the Ruskins made the round\nof Kent in 1831, and though the drawings are by no means in the master's\nstyle, they show some practice in using the pencil.\n\nThe journey was extended by the old route, conditioned by business as\nbefore, round the South Coast to the West of England, and then into\nWales. There his powers of drawing failed him; moonlight on Snowdon was\ntoo vague a subject for the blacklead point but a hint of it could be\nconveyed in rhyme:\n\n    \"Folding like an airy vest,\n    The very clouds had sunk to rest;\n    Light gilds the rugged mountain's breast,\n    Calmly as they lay below;\n    Every hill seemed topped with snow,\n    As the flowing tide of light\n    Broke the slumbers of the night.\"\n\nHarlech Castle was too sublime for a sketch, but it was painted with\nthe pen:\n\n    \"So mighty, so majestic, and so lone;\n    And all thy music, now, the ocean's murmuring.\"\n\nAnd the enthusiasm of mountain glory, a sort of ecstacy of\nuncontrollable passion, strives for articulate deliverance in the\nclimbing song, \"I love ye, ye eternal hills.\"\n\nIt was hard to come back to the daily round, the common task, especially\nwhen, in this autumn of 1831, to Dr. Andrews' Latin and Greek, the\nFrench grammar and Euclid were added, under Mr. Rowbotham. And the new\ntutor had no funny stories to tell; he was not so engaging a man as the\n\"dear Doctor,\" and his memory was not sweet to his wayward pupil. But\nthe parents had chosen for the work one who was favourably known by his\nmanuals, and capable of interesting even a budding poet in the\nmathematics; for our author tells that at Oxford, and ever after, he\nknew his Euclid without the figures, and that he spent all his spare\ntime in trying to trisect an angle. An old letter from Rowbotham informs\nMr. J.J. Ruskin that an eminent mathematician had seen John's attempt,\nand had said that it was the cleverest he knew. In French, too, he\nprogressed enough to be able to find his way alone in Paris two years\nlater. And however the saucy boy may have satirized his tutor in the\ndroll verses on \"Bedtime,\" Mr. Rowbotham always remembered him with\naffection, and spoke of him with respect.\n\nIn spite of these tedious tutorships, he managed to scribble\nenergetically all this winter, writing with amazing rapidity, as his\nmother notes: attempts at Waverley novels, which never got beyond the\nfirst chapter, imitations of \"Childe Harold\" and \"Don Juan\" and scraps\nin the style of everybody in turn. No wonder his mother sent him to bed\nat nine punctually, and kept him from school, in vain efforts to quiet\nhis brain. The lack of companions was made up to him in the friendship\nof Richard Fall, son of a neighbour on \"the Hill,\" a boy without\naffectation or morbidity of disposition whose complementary character\nsuited him well. An affectionate comradeship sprang up between the two\nlads, and lasted, until in middle life they drifted apart, in no\nill-will, but each going on his own course to his own destiny.\n\nSome real advance was made this winter (1831-32) with his Shelleyan\n\"Sonnet to a Cloud\" and his imitations of Byron's \"Hebrew Melodies,\"\nfrom which he learnt how to concentrate expression, and to use rich\nvowel-sounds and liquid consonants with rolling effect. A deeper and\nmore serious turn of thought, that gradually usurped the place of the\nfirst boyish effervescence, has been traced by him to the influence of\nByron, in whom, while others saw nothing more than wit and passion,\nRuskin perceived an earnest mind and a sound judgment.\n\nBut the most sincere poem--if sincerity be marked by unstudied phrase\nand neglected rhyme--the most genuine \"lyrical cry\" of this period, is\nthat song in which our boy-poet poured forth his longing for the \"blue\nhills\" he had loved as a baby, and for those Coniston crags over which,\nwhen he became old and sorely stricken, he was still to see the morning\nbreak. When he wrote these verses he was nearly fourteen, or just past\nhis birthday. It had been eighteen months since he had been in Wales,\nand all the weary while he had seen no mountains; but in his regrets he\ngoes back a year farther still, to fix upon the Lakeland hills, less\nmajestic than Snowdon, but more endeared, and he describes his\nsensations on approaching the beloved objects in the very terms that\nDante uses for his first sight of Beatrice:\n\n    \"I weary for the fountain foaming,\n     For shady holm and hill;\n    My mind is on the mountain roaming,\n     My spirit's voice is still.\n\n    \"The crags are lone on Coniston\n     And Glaramara's dell;\n    And dreary on the mighty one,\n     The cloud-enwreathed Sea-fell....\"\n\n    \"There is a thrill of strange delight\n     That passes quivering o'er me,\n    When blue hills rise upon the sight,\n     Like summer clouds before me.\"\n\nJudge, then, of the delight with which he turned over the pages of a new\nbook, given him this birthday by the kind Mr. Telford, in whose carriage\nhe had first seen those blue hills--a book in which all his mountain\nideals, and more, were caught and kept enshrined--visions still, and of\nmightier peaks and ampler valleys, romantically \"tost\" and sublimely\n\"lost,\" as he had so often written in his favourite rhymes. In the\nvignettes to Rogers' \"Italy,\" Turner had touched the chord for which\nJohn Ruskin had been feeling all these years. No wonder that he took\nTurner for his leader and master, and fondly tried to copy the wonderful\n\"Alps at Daybreak\" to begin with, and then to imitate this new-found\nmagic art with his own subjects and finally to come boldly before the\nworld in passionate defence of a man who had done such great things for\nhim.\n\nThis mountain-worship was not inherited from his father, who never was\nenthusiastic about peaks and clouds and glaciers, though he was\ninterested in all travelling in a general way. So that it was not\nRogers' \"Italy\" that sent the family off to the Alps that summer; but,\nfortunately for John, his father's eye was caught by the romantic\narchitecture of Prout's \"Sketches in Flanders and Germany,\" when it came\nout in April, 1853, and his mother proposed to make both of them happy\nin a tour on the Continent. The business-round was abandoned, but they\ncould see Mr. Domecq on their way back through Paris, and not wholly\nlose the time.\n\nThey waited to keep papa's birthday on May 10, and early next morning\ndrove off--father and mother, John and Mary, Nurse Anne, and the\ncourier Salvador. They crossed to Calais, and posted, as people did in\nthe old times, slowly from point to point; starting betimes, halting at\nthe roadside inns, where John tried to snatch a sketch, reaching their\ndestination early enough to investigate the cathedral or the citadel,\nmonuments of antiquity or achievements of modern civilisation, with\nimpartial eagerness; and before bedtime John would write up his journal\nand work up his sketches just as if he were at home.\n\nSo they went through Flanders and Germany, following Prout's lead by the\ncastles of the Rhine; but at last, at Schaffhausen one Sunday\nevening--\"suddenly--behold--beyond!\"--they had seen the Alps.\nThenceforward Turner was their guide as they crossed the Spl\u00fcgen, sailed\nthe Italian lakes, wondered at Milan Cathedral, and the Mediterranean at\nGenoa, and then roamed through the Oberland and back to Chamouni. All\nthis while a great plan shaped itself in the boy's head, no less than to\nmake a Rogers' \"Italy\" for himself, just as he tried to make a \"Harry\nand Lucy\" or a \"Dictionary of Minerals.\" On every place they passed he\nwould write verses and prose sketches, to give respectively the romance\nand the reality or ridicule; for he saw the comic side of it all,\nkeenly; and he would illustrate the series with Turneresque vignettes,\ndrawn with the finest crowquill pen, to imitate the delicate engravings.\nBy this he learnt more drawing in two or three years than most amateur\nstudents do in seven. For the first year he had the \"Watchtower of\nAndernach\" and the \"Jungfrau from Interlaken\" to show, with others of\nsimilar style, and thenceforward alternated between Turner and Prout,\nuntil he settled into something different from either.\n\nBut Turner and Prout were not the only artists he knew; at Paris he\nfound his way into the Louvre, and got leave from the directors, though\nhe was under the age required, to copy. The picture he chose was a\nRembrandt.\n\nBetween this foreign tour and the next, his amusement was to draw these\nvignettes, and to write the poems suggested by the scenes he had\nvisited. He had outgrown the evening lessons with Dr. Andrews, and as he\nwas fifteen, it was time to think more seriously of preparing him for\nOxford, where his name was put down at Christ Church. His father hoped\nhe would go into the Church, and eventually turn out a combination of a\nByron and a bishop--something like Dean Milman, only better. For this,\ncollege was a necessary preliminary; for college, some little schooling.\nSo they picked the best day-school in the neighbourhood, that of the\nRev. Thomas Dale (afterwards Dean of Rochester), in Grove Lane, Peckham.\nJohn Ruskin worked there rather less than two years. In 1835 he was\ntaken from school in consequence of an attack of pleurisy, and lost the\nrest of that year from regular studies.\n\nMore interesting to him than school was the British Museum collection of\nminerals, where he worked occasionally with his Jamieson's Dictionary.\nBy this time he had a fair student's collection of his own, and he\nincreased it by picking up specimens at Matlock, or Clifton, or in the\nAlps, wherever he went, for he was not short of pocket-money. He took\nthe greatest pains over his catalogues, and wrote elaborate accounts of\nthe various minerals in a shorthand he invented out of Greek letters and\ncrystal forms.\n\nGrafted on this mineralogy, and stimulated by the Swiss tour, was a new\ninterest in physical geology, which his father so far approved as to\ngive him Saussure's \"Voyages dans les Alpes\" for his birthday in 1834.\nIn this book he found the complement of Turner's vignettes, something\nlike a key to the \"reason why\" of all the wonderful forms and marvellous\nmountain-architecture of the Alps. He soon wrote a short essay on the\nsubject, and had the pleasure of seeing it in print, in Loudon's\n_Magazine of Natural History_ for March, 1834, along with another bit\nof his writing, asking for information on the cause of the colour of the\nRhine-water.\n\nHe had already some acquaintance with J.C. Loudon, F.L.S., H.S., etc.,\nand he was on the staff of that versatile editor not long afterwards,\nand took a lion's share of the writing in the _Magazine of\nArchitecture_. Meanwhile he had been introduced to another editor, and\nto the publishers with whom he did business for many a year to come. The\nacquaintance was made in a curious, accidental manner. His cousin\nCharles Richardson, clerk to Smith, Elder, and Co., had the opportunity\nof mentioning the young poet's name to Thomas Pringle, editor of the\n\"Friendship's Offering\" which John had admired and imitated. Mr. Pringle\ncame out to Herne Hill, and was hospitably entertained as a brother\nScot, as not only an editor, but a poet himself--not _only_ a poet, but\na man of respectability and piety, who had been a missionary in South\nAfrica. In return for this hospitality he gave a good report of John's\nverses, and, after getting him to re-write two of the best passages in\nthe last tour, carried them off for insertion in his forthcoming number.\nHe did more: he carried John to see the actual Samuel Rogers, whose\nverses had been adorned by the great Turner's vignettes.\n\nAfter the pleurisy of April, 1835, his parents took him abroad again,\nand he made great preparations to use the opportunity to the utmost. He\nwould study geology in the field, and took Saussure in his trunk he\nwould note meteorology: he made a cyanometer--a scale of blue to measure\nthe depth of tone, the colour whether of Rhine-water or of Alpine skies.\nHe would sketch. By now he had abandoned the desire to make MS. albums,\nafter seeing himself in print, and so chose rather to imitate the\nimitable, and to follow Prout, this time with careful outlines on the\nspot, than to idealize his notes in mimic Turnerism. He kept a prose\njournal, chiefly of geology and scenery, as well as a versified\ndescription, written in a metre imitated from \"Don Juan,\" but more\nelaborate, and somewhat of a _tour de force_ in rhyming. But that\npoetical journal was dropped after he had carried it through France,\nacross the Jura, and to Chamouni. The drawing crowded it out, and for\nthe first time he found himself as ready with his pencil as he had been\nwith his pen.\n\nHis route is marked by the drawings of that year, from Chamouni to the\nSt. Bernard and Aosta, back to the Oberland and up the St. Gothard; then\nback again to Lucerne and round by the Stelvio to Venice and Verona, and\nfinally through the Tyrol and Germany homewards. The ascent of the St.\nBernard was told in a dramatic sketch of great humour and power of\ncharacterization, and a letter to Richard Fall records the night on the\nRigi, when he saw the splendid sequence of storm, sunset, moonlight, and\ndaybreak, which forms the subject of one of the most impressive passages\nof \"Modern Painters.\"\n\nIt happened that Pringle had a plate of Salzburg which he wanted to\nprint in order to make up the volume of \"Friendship's Offering\" for the\nnext Christmas. He seems to have asked John Ruskin to furnish a copy of\nverses for the picture, and at Salzburg, accordingly, a bit of rhymed\ndescription was written and re-written, and sent home to the editor.\nEarly in December the Ruskins returned, and at Christmas there came to\nHerne Hill a gorgeous gilt morocco volume, \"To John Ruskin, from the\nPublishers.\" On opening it there were his \"Andernach\" and \"St. Goar,\"\nand his \"Salzburg\" opposite a beautifully-engraved plate, all hills,\ntowers, boats, and figures moving picturesquely under the sunset, in\nTurner's manner more or less, \"Engraved by E. Goodall from a drawing by\nW. Purser.\" It was almost like being Mr. Rogers himself.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nTHE GERM OF \"MODERN PAINTERS\" (1836)\n\n\nHe was now close upon seventeen, and it was time to think seriously of\nhis future. His father went to Oxford early in the year to consult the\nauthorities about matriculation. Meantime they sent him to Mr. Dale for\nsome private lessons, and for the lectures on logic, English literature,\nand translation, which were given on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays at\nKing's College, London. John enjoyed his new circumstances heartily.\nFrom voluminous letters, it is evident that he was in high spirits and\nin pleasant company. He was a thorough boy among boys--Matson,\nWilloughby, Tom Dale and the rest. He joined in their pranks, and\ncontributed to their amusement with his ready good-humour and unflagging\ndrollery.\n\nMr. Dale told him there was plenty of time before October, and no fear\nabout his passing, if he worked hard. He found the work easy, except\nepigram-writing, which he thought \"excessively stupid and laborious,\"\nbut helped himself out, when scholarship failed, with native wit. Some\nof his exercises remain, not very brilliant Latinity; some he saucily\nevaded, thus:\n\n    \"Subject: _Non sapere maximum est malum._\n\n    \"Non sapere est grave; sed, cum dura epigrammata oportet\n     Scribere, tunc sentis pr\u00e6cipue esse malum.\"\n\nIn Switzerland and Italy, during the autumn of 1835, he had made a great\nmany drawings, carefully outlined in pencil or pen on gray paper, and\nsparsely touched with body colour, in direct imitation of the Prout\nlithographs. Prout's original coloured sketches he had seen, no doubt,\nin the exhibition; but he does not seem to have thought of imitating\nthem, for his work in this kind was all intended to be for illustration\nand not for framing. The \"Italy\" vignettes likewise, with all their\ninspiration, suggested to him only pen-etching; he was hardly conscious\nthat somewhere there existed the tiny, coloured pictures that Turner had\nmade for the engraver. Still, now that he could draw really well, his\nfather, who painted in water-colours himself, complied with the demand\nfor better teaching than Runciman's, went straight to the President of\nthe Old Water-Colour Society, and engaged him for the usual course of\nhalf a dozen lessons at a guinea a piece. Copley Fielding could draw\nmountains as nobody else but Turner could, in water-colour; he had\nenough mystery and poetry to interest the younger Ruskin, and enough\nresemblance to ordinary views of Nature to please the elder. So they\nboth went to Newman Street to his painting-room, and John worked through\nthe course, and a few extra lessons, but, after all, found Fielding's\nart was not what he wanted. Some sketches exist, showing the influence\nof the spongy style; but his characteristic way of work remained for him\nto devise for himself.\n\nAt the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1836 Turner showed the first striking\nexamples of his later style in \"Juliet and her Nurse,\" \"Mercury and\nArgus,\" and \"Rome from Mount Aventine.\" The strange idealism, the\nunusualness, the mystery, of these pictures, united with evidence of\nintense significance and subtle observation, appealed to young Ruskin as\nit appealed to few other spectators. Public opinion regretted this\nchange in its old favourite, the draughtsman of Oxford colleges, the\npainter of shipwrecks and castles. And _Blackwood's Magazine_, which the\nRuskins, as Edinburgh people and admirers of Christopher North, read\nwith respect, spoke about Turner, in a review of the picture-season,\nwith that freedom of speech which Scotch reviewers claim as a heritage\nfrom the days of Jeffrey. Young Ruskin at once dashed off an answer.\n\nThe critic had found that Turner was \"out of nature\"; Ruskin tried to\nshow that the pictures were full of facts, but treated with poetical\nlicense. The critic pronounced Turner's colour bad, his execution\nneglected, and his chiaroscuro childish; in answer to which Ruskin\nexplained that Turner's reasoned system was to represent light and shade\nby the contrast of warm and cold colour, rather than by the opposition\nof white and black which other painters used. He denied that his\nexecution was other than his aims necessitated, and maintained that the\ncritic had no right to force his cut-and-dried academic rules of\ncomposition on a great genius; at the same time admitting that:\n\n\n     \"The faults of Turner are numerous, and perhaps more egregious than\n     those of any other great existing artist; but if he has greater\n     faults, he has also greater beauties.\n\n     \"His imagination is Shakespearian in its mightiness. Had the scene\n     of 'Juliet and her Nurse' risen up before the mind of a poet, and\n     been described in 'words that burn,' it had been the admiration of\n     the world.... Many-coloured mists are floating above the distant\n     city, but such mists as you might imagine to be ethereal spirits,\n     souls of the mighty dead breathed out of the tombs of Italy into\n     the blue of her bright heaven, and wandering in vague and infinite\n     glory around the earth that they have loved. Instinct with the\n     beauty of uncertain light, they move and mingle among the pale\n     stars, and rise up into the brightness of the illimitable heaven,\n     whose soft, sad blue eye gazes down into the deep waters of the sea\n     for ever--that sea whose motionless and silent transparency is\n     beaming with phosphor light, that emanates out of its sapphire\n     serenity like bright dreams breathed into the spirit of a deep\n     sleep. And the spires of the glorious city rise indistinctly bright\n     into those living mists, like pyramids of pale fire from some vast\n     altar; and amidst the glory of the dream there is, as it were, the\n     voice of a multitude entering by the eye, arising from the\n     stillness of the city like the summer wind passing over the leaves\n     of the forest, when a murmur is heard amidst their multitudes.\n\n     \"This, O Maga, is the picture which your critic has pronounced to\n     be 'like models of different parts of Venice, streaked blue and\n     white, and thrown into a flour-tub'!\"\n\nBefore sending his reply to the editor of _Blackwood_, as had been\nintended, it was thought only right that Turner should be consulted. The\nMS. was enclosed to his address in London, with a courteous note from\nMr. John James Ruskin, asking his permission to publish. Turner replied,\nexpressing the scorn he felt for anonymous attacks, and jestingly\nhinting that the art-critics of the old Scotch school found their\n\"meal-tub\" in danger from his \"flour-tub\"; but \"he never moved in such\nmatters,\" so he sent on the MS. to Mr. Munro of Novar, who had bought\nthe picture.\n\nTen days or so after this episode John Ruskin was matriculated at Oxford\n(October 18, 1836). He told the story of his first appearance as a\ngownsman in one of his gossiping letters in verse:\n\n    \"A night, a day past o'er--the time drew near--\n    The morning came--I felt a little queer;\n    Came to the push; paid some tremendous fees;\n    Past; and was capped and gowned with marvellous ease.\n    Then went to the Vice-Chancellor to swear\n    Not to wear boots, nor cut or comb my hair\n    Fantastically--to shun all such sins\n    As playing marbles or frequenting inns;\n    Always to walk with breeches black or brown on;\n    When I go out, to put my cap and gown on;\n    With other regulations of the sort, meant\n    For the just ordering of my comportment.\n    Which done, in less time than I can rehearse it, I\n    Found myself member of the University!\"\n\nIn pursuance of his plan for getting the best of everything, his father\nhad chosen the best college, as far as he knew, that in which social and\nscholastic advantages were believed to be found in pre-eminent\ncombination, and he had chosen what was thought to be the best position\nin the college; so that it was as gentleman-commoner of Christ Church\nthat John Ruskin made his entrance into the academic world.\n\nAfter matriculation, the Ruskins made a fortnight's tour to Southampton\nand the coast, and returned to Herne Hill. John went back to King's\nCollege, and in December was examined in the subjects of his lectures.\nHe wrote to his father on Christmas Eve about the examination in English\nliterature:\n\n\n     \"The students were numerous, and so were the questions; the room\n     was hot, the papers long, the pens bad, the ink pale, and the\n     interrogations difficult. It lasted only three hours. I wrote\n     answers in very magnificent style to all the questions except three\n     or four; gave in my paper and heard no more of the matter: _sic\n     transeunt bore-ia mundi_.\"\n\nHe went on to mention his \"very longitudinal essay,\" which, since no\nother essays are reported in his letters about King's College, must be\nthe paper published in 1893, in answer to the question. \"Does the\nperusal of works of fiction act favourably or unfavourably on the moral\ncharacter?\"\n\nAt his farewell interview with Mr. Dale he was asked, as he writes to\nhis father, what books he had read, and replied with a pretty long list,\nincluding Quintilian and Grotius. Mr. Dale inquired what \"light books\"\nhe was taking to Oxford: \"Saussure, Humboldt, and other works on natural\nphilosophy and geology,\" he answered. \"Then he asked if I ever read any\nof the modern fashionable novels; on this point I thought he began to\nlook positive, so I gave him a negative, with the exception of Bulwer's,\nand now and then a laughable one of the Theodore Hook's or Captain\nMarryat's.\" And so, with much excellent advice about exercise and sleep,\nand the way to win the Newdigate, he parted from Mr. Dale.\n\nThis Christmas was marked by his first introduction to the scientific\nworld. Mr. Charlesworth, of the British Museum, invited him to a meeting\nof the Geological Society (January 4, 1837), with promise of\nintroduction to Buckland and Lyell. The meeting, as he wrote, was\n\"amusing and interesting, and very comfortable for frosty weather, as\nMr. Murchison got warm and Mr. Greenau _(sic)_ witty. The warmth,\nhowever, got the better of the wit.\"\n\nThe Meteorological Society also claimed his attention, and in this month\nhe contributed a paper which \"Richard [Fall] says will frighten them out\nof their meteorological wits, containing six close-written folio pages,\nand having, at its conclusion, a sting in its tail, the very agreeable\nannouncement that it only commences the subject.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nA LOVE-STORY (1836-1839)\n\n\nEarly in 1836 the quiet of Herne Hill was fluttered by a long-promised,\nlong-postponed visit. Mr. Domecq at last brought his four younger\ndaughters to make the acquaintance of their English friends. The eldest\nsister had lately been married to a Count Maison, heir to a peer of\nFrance; for Mr. Domecq, thanks in great measure to his partner's energy\nand talents, was prosperous and wealthy, and moved in the enchanted\ncircles of Parisian society.\n\nTo a romantic schoolboy in a London suburb the apparition was dazzling.\nAny of the sisters would have charmed him, but the eldest of the four,\nAd\u00e8le Clotilde, bewitched him at once with her graceful figure and that\noval face which was so admired in those times. She was fair,\ntoo--another recommendation. He was on the brink of seventeen, at the\nripe moment, and he fell passionately in love with her. She was only\nfifteen, and did not understand this adoration, unspoken and unexpressed\nexcept by intensified shyness; for he was a very shy boy in the\ndrawing-room, though brimming over with life and fun among his\nschoolfellows. His mother's ideals of education did not include French\ngallantry; he felt at a loss before these Paris-bred, Paris-dressed\nyoung ladies, and encumbered by the very strength of his new-found\npassion.\n\nAnd yet he possessed advantages, if he had known how to use them. He was\ntall and active, light and lithe in gesture, not a clumsy hobbledehoy.\nHe had the face that caught the eye, in Rome a few years later, of\nKeats' Severn, no mean judge, surely, of faces and poet's faces. He was\nundeniably clever; he knew all about minerals and mountains; he was\nquite an artist, and a printed poet. But these things weigh little with\na girl of fifteen who wants to be amused; and so she only laughed at\nJohn.\n\nHe tried to amuse her, but he tried too seriously. He wrote a story to\nread her, \"Leoni, a Legend of Italy,\" for of course she understood\nenough English to be read to, no doubt to be wooed in, seeing her mother\nwas English. The story was of brigands and true lovers, the thing that\nwas popular in the romantic period. The costumery and mannerisms of the\nlittle romance are out of date now, and seem ridiculous, though Mr.\nPringle and the public were pleased with it then, when it was printed in\n\"Friendship's Offering.\" But the girl of fifteen only laughed the more.\n\nWhen they left, he had no interest in his tour-book; even the mountains,\nfor the time, had lost their power, and all his plans of great works\nwere dropped for a new style of verse--the love-poems of 1836.\n\nHis father, from whom he kept nothing, approved the verses, and did not\ndisapprove his views on the young lady. Indeed, it is quite plain, from\nthe correspondence of the two gentlemen, that Mr. Domecq intended his\nfriend and partner's son to become his own son-in-law. He had the\ngreatest respect for the Ruskins, and every reason for desiring to link\ntheir fortunes still more closely with those of his own family. But to\nMrs. Ruskin, with her religious feelings, it was intolerable,\nunbelievable, that the son whom she had brought up in the nurture and\nadmonition of the strictest Protestantism should fix his heart on an\nalien in race and creed. The wonder is that their relations were not\nmore strained; there are few young men who would have kept unbroken\nallegiance to a mother whose sympathy failed them at such a crisis.\n\nAs the year went on his passion seemed to grow in the absence of the\nbeloved object. His only plan of winning her was to win his spurs first;\nbut as what? Clearly his forte, it seemed, was in writing. If he could\nbe a successful writer of romances, of songs, of plays, surely she would\nnot refuse him. And so he began another romantic story, \"Velasquez, the\nNovice,\" opening with the Monks of St. Bernard, among whom had been, so\nthe tale ran, a mysterious member, whose papers, when discovered, made\nhim out the hero of adventures in Venice. He began a play, which was to\nbe another great work, \"Marcolini.\" He had no playwright's eye for\nsituations, but the conversation is animated, and the characters finely\ndrawn, with more discrimination than one would expect from so young an\nauthor.\n\nThis work was interrupted at the end of Act III. by pressing calls to\nother studies. But it was not that he had forgotten Ad\u00e8le. From time to\ntime he wrote verses to her or about her; and as in 1838 she was sent to\nschool with her sisters at Newhall, near Chelmsford, to \"finish\" her in\nEnglish, in that August he saw her again. She had lost some of her first\ngirlish prettiness, but that made no difference. And when the Domecqs\ncame to Herne Hill at Christmas, he was as deeply in love as ever. But\nshe still laughed at him.\n\nHis father was fond of her, liked all the sisters, and thought much of\nthem as girls of fine character, but he liked Ad\u00e8le best. He seems to\nhave been fond of his partner, too, worked very hard in his interests,\nand behaved very well to his heirs afterwards through many years of\nresponsible and difficult management of their business. And at this\ntime, when he went down to the convent school in Essex, as he often did,\nhe must have had opportunities for seeing how hopeless the case was. Mr.\nDomecq recognised it, too, but thought, it seems (they manage these\nthings differently in France), that any of his daughters would do as\nwell, and early in 1839 entertained an offer from Baron Duquesne, a rich\nand handsome young Frenchman. They kept this from John, fearing he would\nbreak down at the news, so fully did they recognise the importance of\nthe affair. They even threw other girls in his way. It was not\ndifficult, for by now he had made some mark in magazine literature, and\nwas a steady, rising young man, with considerable expectations. But he\ncould not think of any other girl.\n\nIn February or March, 1839, Mr. Domecq died. The Maisons came to\nEngland, and the marriage was proposed. Ad\u00e8le stayed at Chelmsford until\nSeptember, when he wrote the long poem of \"Farewell,\" dated the eve of\ntheir last meeting and parting.\n\nAt twenty young men do not die of love; but I find that a fortnight\nafter writing this he was taken seriously ill. During the winter of\n1839-40 the negotiations for the marriage in Paris went on. It took\nplace in March. They kept the news from him as long as they could, for\nhe was in the schools next Easter term, and Mr. Brown (his college\ntutor) had seemed to hope he would get a First, so his mother wrote to\nher husband. In May he was pronounced consumptive, and had to give up\nOxford, and all hope of the distinction for which he had laboured, and\nwith that any plans that might have been entertained for his distinction\nin the Church. And his parents' letters of the period put it beyond a\ndoubt that this first great calamity of his life was the direct\nconsequence of that unfortunate matchmaking.\n\nFor nearly two years he was dragged about from place to place, and from\ndoctor to doctor, in search of health. Thanks partly to wise treatment,\nmore to new faces, and most to a plucky determination to employ himself\nusefully with his pen and his pencil, he gradually freed himself from\nthe spell, and fifty years afterwards could look back upon the story as\na pretty comedy of his youthful days.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n\"KATA PHUSIN\" (1837-1838)\n\n\nDevoted as she was to her husband, Mrs. Ruskin felt bound to watch over\nher son at Oxford. It was his health she was always anxious about;\ndoctoring was her forte. He had suffered from pleurisy; caught cold\neasily; was feared to be weak in the lungs; and nobody but his mother\nunderstood him. So taking Mary Richardson, she went up with him\n(January, 1837), and settled in lodgings at Adams' in the High. Her plan\nwas to make no intrusion on his college life, but to require him to\nreport himself every day to her. She would not be dull; she could drive\nabout and see the country, and to that end took her own carriage to\nOxford, the \"fly\" which had been set up two years before. John had been\nrather sarcastic about its genteel appearance. \"No one,\" he said, \"would\nsit down to draw the form of it.\" However, she and Mary drove to Oxford,\nand reckoned that it would only mean fifteen months' absence from home\naltogether, great part of which deserted papa would spend in travelling.\n\nJohn went into residence in Peckwater. At first he spent every evening\nwith his mother and went to bed, as Mr. Dale had told him, at ten. After\na few days Professor Powell asked him to a musical evening; he excused\nhimself, and explained why. The Professor asked to be introduced,\nwhereupon says his mother, \"I shall return the call, but make no\nvisiting acquaintances.\"\n\nThe \"early-to-bed\" plan was also impracticable. It was not long before\nsomebody came hammering at his \"oak\" just as he was getting to sleep,\nand next morning he told his mother that he really ought to have a glass\nof wine to give. So she sent him a couple of bottles over, and that very\nnight \"Mr. Liddell and Mr. Gaisford\" (junior) turned up. \"John was glad\nhe had wine to offer, but they would not take any; they had come to see\nsketches. John says Mr. Liddell looked at them with the eye of a judge\nand the delight of an artist, and swore they were the best sketches he\nhad ever seen. John accused him of quizzing, but he answered that he\nreally thought them excellent.\" John said that it was the scenes which\nmade the pictures; Mr. Liddell knew better, and spread the fame of them\nover the college. Next morning \"Lord Emlyn and Lord Ward called to look\nat the sketches,\" and when the undergraduates had dropped in one after\nanother, the Dean himself, even the terrible Gaisford, sent for the\nportfolio, and returned it with august approval.\n\nLiddell, afterwards Dean of Christ Church; Newton, afterwards Sir\nCharles, of the British Museum; Acland, afterwards Sir Henry, the\nProfessor of Medicine, thus became John Ruskin's friends: the first\ndisputing with him on the burning question of Raphael's art, but from\nthe outset an admirer of \"Modern Painters,\" and always an advocate of\nits author; the second differing from him on the claims of Greek\narch\u00e6ology, but nevertheless a close acquaintance through many long\nyears; and the third for half a century the best of friends and\ncounsellors.\n\nThe dons of his college he was less likely to attract. Dr. Buckland, the\nfamous geologist, and still more famous lecturer and talker, took notice\nof him and employed him in drawing diagrams for lectures. The Rev.\nWalter Brown, his college tutor, afterwards Rector of Wendlebury, won\nhis good-will and remained his friend. His private tutor, the Rev.\nOsborne Gordon, was always regarded with affectionate respect. But the\nrest seem to have looked upon him as a somewhat desultory and erratic\nyoung genius, who might or might not turn out well. For their immediate\npurpose, the Schools, and Church or State preferment, he seemed hardly\nthe fittest man.\n\nThe gentlemen-commoners of Christ Church were a puzzle to Mrs. Ruskin;\nnoblemen of sporting tastes, who rode and betted and drank, and got\ntheir impositions written \"by men attached to the University for the\npurpose, at 1s.6d. to 2s.6d., so you have only to reckon how much you\nwill give to avoid chapel.\" And yet they were very nice fellows. If they\nbegan by riding on John's back round the quad, they did not give him the\ncold shoulder--quite the reverse. He was asked everywhere to wine; he\nbeat them all at chess; and they invaded him at all hours. \"It does\nlittle good sporting _his_ oak,\" wrote his mother, describing how Lord\nDesart and Grimston climbed in through his window while he was hard at\nwork. \"They say midshipmen and Oxonians have more lives than a cat, and\nthey have need of them if they run such risks.\"\n\nOnce, but once only, he was guilty, as an innocent freshman, of a breach\nof the laws of his order. He wrote too good an essay. He tells his\nfather:\n\n\n     \"OXFORD, _February_, 1837.\n\n     \"Yesterday (Saturday) forenoon the Sub-dean sent for me, took me up\n     into his study, sat down with me, and read over my essay, pointing\n     out a few verbal alterations and suggesting improvements; I, of\n     course, expressed myself highly grateful for his condescension.\n     Going out, I met Strangeways. 'So you're going to read out to-day,\n     Ruskin. _Do_ go it at a good rate, my good fellow. Why do you write\n     such devilish good ones?' Went a little farther and met March.\n     'Mind you stand on the top of the desk, Ruskin; gentlemen-commoners\n     never stand on the steps.' I asked him whether it would look more\n     dignified to stand head or heels uppermost. He advised heels. Then\n     met Desart. 'We must have a grand supper after this, Ruskin;\n     gentlemen-commoners always have a flare-up after reading their\n     themes.' I told him I supposed he wanted to 'pison my\n     rum-and-water.'\"\n\nAnd though they teased him unmercifully, he seems to have given as good\nas he got. At a big wine after the event, they asked him whether his\nessay cost 2s.6d. or 5s. What he answered is not reported; but they\nproceeded to make a bonfire in Peckwater, while he judiciously escaped\nto bed.\n\nSo for a home-bred boy, thrown into rather difficult surroundings, his\nfirst appearance at Christ Church was distinctly a success.\n\"Collections\" in March, 1837, went off creditably for him. Hussey,\nKynaston and the Dean said he had taken great pains with his work, and\nhad been a pattern of regularity; and he ended his first term very well\npleased with his college and with himself.\n\nIn his second term he had the honour of being elected to the Christ\nChurch Club, a very small and very exclusive society of the best men in\nthe college: \"Simeon, Acland, and Mr. Denison proposed him; Lord Carew\nand Broadhurst supported.\" And he had the opportunity of meeting men of\nmark, as the following letter recounts. He writes on April 22, 1837:\n\n\n     \"My Dearest Father,\n\n     \"When I returned from hall yesterday--where a servitor read, or\n     pretended to read, and Decanus growled at him, 'Speak out!'--I\n     found a note on my table from Dr. Buckland, requesting the pleasure\n     of my company to dinner, at six, to meet two celebrated geologists,\n     Lord Cole and Sir Philip Egerton. I immediately sent a note of\n     thanks and acceptance, dressed, and was there a minute after the\n     last stroke of Tom. Alone for five minutes in Dr. B.'s\n     drawing-room, who soon afterwards came in with Lord Cole,\n     introduced me, and said that as we were both geologists he did not\n     hesitate to leave us together while he did what he certainly very\n     much required--brushed up a little. Lord Cole and I were talking\n     about some fossils newly arrived from India. He remarked in the\n     course of conversation that his friend Dr. B.'s room was cleaner\n     and in better order than he remembered ever to have seen it. There\n     was not a chair fit to sit upon, all covered with dust, broken\n     alabaster candlesticks, withered flower-leaves, frogs cut out of\n     serpentine, broken models of fallen temples, torn papers, old\n     manuscripts, stuffed reptiles, deal boxes, brown paper, wool, tow\n     and cotton, and a considerable variety of other articles. In came\n     Mrs. Buckland, then Sir Philip Egerton and his brother, whom I had\n     seen at Dr. B.'s lecture, though he is not an undergraduate. I was\n     talking to him till dinner-time. While we were sitting over our\n     wine after dinner, in came Dr. Daubeny, one of the most celebrated\n     geologists of the day--a curious little animal, looking through its\n     spectacles with an air very _distingu\u00e9e_--and Mr. Darwin, whom I\n     had heard read a paper at the Geological Society. He and I got\n     together, and talked all the evening.\"\n\nThe long vacation of 1837 was passed in a tour through the North, during\nwhich his advanced knowledge of art was shown in a series of admirable\ndrawings. Their subjects are chiefly architectural, though a few\nmountain drawings are found in his sketch-book for that summer.\n\nThe interest in ancient and picturesque buildings was no new thing, and\nit seems to have been the branch of art-study which was chiefly\nencouraged by his father. During this tour among Cumberland cottages and\nYorkshire abbeys, a plan was formed for a series of papers on\narchitecture, perhaps in answer to an invitation from his friend Mr.\nLoudon, who had started an architectural magazine. In the summer he\nbegan to write \"The Poetry of Architecture; or, The Architecture of the\nNations of Europe considered in its Association with Natural Scenery and\nNational Character,\" and the papers were worked off month by month from\nOxford, or wherever he might be, only terminating with the termination\nof the magazine in January, 1839. They parade a good deal of classical\nlearning and travelled experience; readers of the magazine took their\nauthor for some dilettante Don at Oxford. The editor did not wish the\nillusion to be dispelled, so John Ruskin had to choose a _nom de\nplume_. He called himself \"Kata Phusin\" (\"according to nature\"), for he\nhad begun to read some Aristotle. No phrase would have better expressed\nhis point of view, that of commonsense extended by experience, and\nconfirmed by the appeal to matters of fact, rather than to any\nauthority, or tradition, or committee of taste, or abstract principles.\n\nWhile these papers were in process of publication \"Kata Phusin\" plunged\ninto his first controversy, as an opponent of \"Parsey's Convergence of\nPerpendiculars,\" according to which vertical lines should have a\nvanishing point, even though they are assumed to be parallel to the\nplane of the picture.\n\nDuring this controversy, and just before the summer tour of 1838 to\nScotland, John Ruskin was introduced to Miss Charlotte Withers, a young\nlady who was as fond of music as he was of drawing. They discussed their\nfavourite studies with eagerness, and, to settle the matter, he wrote a\nlong essay on \"The Comparative Advantages of the Studies of Music and\nPainting,\" in which he set painting as a means of recreation and of\neducation far above music.\n\nAlready at nineteen, then, we see him a writer on art, not full-fledged,\nbut attracting some notice. Towards the end of 1838 a question arose as\nto the best site for the proposed Scott memorial at Edinburgh, and a\nwriter in the _Architectural Magazine_ quoted \"Kata Phusin\" as the\nauthority in such matters, saying that it was obvious, after those\npapers of his, that design and site should be simultaneously considered;\non which the editor \"begs the favour of 'Kata Phusin' to let our readers\nhave his opinion on the subject, which we certainly think of\nconsiderable importance.\"\n\nSo he discussed the question of monuments in general, and of this one in\nparticular, in a long paper, coming to no very decided opinion, but\npreferring, on the whole, a statue group with a colossal Scott on a\nrough pedestal, to be placed on Salisbury Crags, \"where the range gets\nlow and broken towards the north at about the height of St. Anthony's\nChapel.\" His paper did not influence the Edinburgh Committee, but it was\nnot without effect, as the following extract shows.\n\n\n     \"BAYSWATER, _November_ 30, 1838.\n\n     \"DEAR SIR,--... Your son is certainly the greatest natural genius\n     that ever it has been my fortune to become acquainted with, and I\n     cannot but feel proud to think that at some future period, when\n     both you and I are under the turf, it will be stated in the\n     literary history of your son's life that the first article of his\n     which was published was in _London's Magazine of Natural\n     History._--Yours very sincerely,\n\n     \"J.C. LOUDON\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nSIR ROGER NEWDIGATE'S PRIZE (1837-1839)\n\n\nOf all the prizes which Oxford could bestow, the Newdigate used to be\nthe most popular. Its fortunate winner was an admitted poet in an age\nwhen poetry was read, and he appeared in his glory at Commemoration,\nspeaking what the ladies could understand and admire. The honour was\nattainable without skill in Greek particles or in logarithms; and yet it\nhad a real value to an intending preacher, for the successful reciter\nmight be felt to have put his foot on the pulpit stairs. John Ruskin was\ndefinitely meant for the Church, and he went to Oxford in the avowed\nhope of getting the Newdigate, if nothing else. His last talk with Mr.\nDale was chiefly about ways and means to this end; and before he went up\nhe had begun \"The Gipsies\" for March, 1837.\n\nThe prize was won that year by Arthur Penrhyn Stanley, afterwards Dean\nof Westminster. Our candidate and his old schoolfellow, Henry Dart, of\nExeter College, set to work on the next subject, \"The Exile of St.\nHelena,\" and after the long vacation read their work to each other,\naccepting the hints and corrections of a friendly rivalry.\n\nMeantime his old nurse Anne (it is trivial, but a touch of nature),\nbeing at Oxford in attendance on the ladies, and keen, as she always\nwas, for Master John's success, heard from the keeper of the\nReading-room of criticisms on his published verses. She brought the news\nto his delighted mother. \"He was pleased,\" she writes, \"but says that he\nforms his own estimate of his poems, and reviews don't alter it; but\n'How my father will be delighted! How he will crow!'\" Which historiette\nrepeated itself many a time in the family annals.\n\nIn Lent term, 1838, he was hard at work on the new poem. He wrote:\n\n\n     \"I must give an immense time every day to the Newdigate, which I\n     must have, if study will get it. I have much to revise. You find\n     many faults, but there are hundreds which have escaped your notice,\n     and many lines must go out altogether which you and I should wish\n     to stay in. The thing must be remodelled, and I must finish it\n     while it has a freshness on it, otherwise it will not be written\n     well. The old lines are hackneyed in my ears, even as a very soft\n     Orleans plum, which your Jewess has wiped and re-wiped with the\n     corner of her apron, till its polish is perfect, and its\n     temperature elevated.\"\n\nIn this March he got through his \"Smalls.\"\n\n\n     \"Nice thing to get over; quite a joke, as everybody says when\n     they've got through with the feathers on. It's a kind of\n     emancipation from freshness--a thing unpleasant in an egg, but\n     dignified in an Oxonian--very. Lowe very kind; Kynaston ditto--nice\n     fellows--urbane. How they _do_ frighten people! There was one man\n     all but crying with mere fear. Kynaston had to coax him like a\n     child. Poor fellow! he had some reason to be afraid; did his logic\n     shockingly. People always take up logic because they fancy it\n     doesn't require a good memory, and there is nothing half so\n     productive of pluck; they _never_ know it. I was very cool when I\n     got into it; found the degree of excitement agreeable; nibbled the\n     end of my pen and grinned at Kynaston over the table as if _I_ had\n     been going to pluck _him_. They always smile when they mean pluck.\"\n\nThe Newdigate for 1838, for all his care and pains, was won by Dart. He\nwas, at any rate, beaten by a friend, and with a poem which his own\nhonourable sympathy and assistance had helped to perfect.\n\nAnother trifling incident lets us get a glimpse of the family life of\nour young poet. The Queen's coronation in June, 1838, was a great event\nto all the world, and Mr. Ruskin was anxious for his son to see it. Much\ncorrespondence ensued between the parents, arranging everything for him,\nas they always did--which of the available tickets should be accepted,\nand whether he could stand the fatigue of the long waiting, and so\nforth. Mrs. Ruskin did not like the notion of her boy sitting perched on\nrickety scaffolding at dizzy altitudes in the Abbey. Mr. Ruskin,\nevidently determined to carry his point, went to Westminster, bribed the\ncarpenters, climbed the structure, and reported all safe to stand a\ncentury, \"though,\" said he, \"the gold and scarlet of the decorations\nappeared very paltry compared with the Wengern Alp.\" But he could not\nfind No. 447, and wrote to the Heralds' Office to know if it was a place\nfrom which a good view could be got. Blue-mantle replied that it was a\nvery good place, and Lord Brownlow had just taken tickets for his sons\nclose by. Then there was the great question of dress. He went to Owen's\nand ordered a white satin waistcoat with gold sprigs, and a high\ndress-coat with bright buttons, and asked his wife to see about white\ngloves at Oxford--a Court white neck-cloth or a black satin would do.\n\nPicture, then, the young Ruskin in those dressy days. A portrait was\nonce sent to Brantwood of a dandy in a green coat of wonderful cut,\nsupposed to represent him in his youth, but suggesting Lord Lytton's\n\"Pelham\" rather than the homespun-suited seer of Coniston. \"Did you ever\nwear a coat like that?\" I asked. \"I'm not so sure that I didn't,\" said\nhe.\n\nAfter that, they went to Scotland and the North of England for the\nsummer, and more fine sketches were made, some of which hang now in his\ndrawing-room, and compare not unfavourably with the Prouts beside them.\nIn firmness of line and fulness of insight they are masterly, and mark a\nrapid progress, all the more astonishing when it is recollected how\nlittle time could have been spared for practice. The subjects are\nchiefly architectural--castles and churches and Gothic details--and one\nis not surprised to find him soon concerned with the Oxford Society for\nPromoting the Study of Gothic Architecture. \"They were all reverends,\"\nsays a letter of the time, \"and wanted somebody to rouse them.\"\n\nScience, too, progressed this year. We read of geological excursions to\nShotover with Lord Carew and Lord Kildare--one carrying the hammer and\nanother the umbrella--and actual discoveries of saurian remains; and\nmany a merry meeting at Dr. Buckland's, in which, at intervals of\nscientific talk, John romped with the youngsters of the family. After a\nwhile the Dean took the opportunity of a walk through Oxford to the\nClarendon to warn him not to spend too much time on science. It did not\npay in the Schools nor in the Church, and he had too many irons in the\nfire.\n\nDrawing, and science, and the prose essays mentioned in the last\nchapter, and poetry, all these were his by-play. Of the poetry, the\nNewdigate was but a little part. In \"Friendship's Offering\" this autumn\nhe published \"Remembrance,\" one of many poems to Ad\u00e8le, \"Christ Church,\"\nand the \"Scythian Grave.\" In this last he gave free rein to the morbid\nimaginations to which his unhappy _affaire de coeur_ and the mental\nexcitement of the period predisposed him. Harrison, his literary\nMentor, approved these poems, and inserted them in \"Friendship's\nOffering,\" along with love-songs and other exercises in verse. One had a\ngreat success and was freely copied--the sincerest flattery--and the\npreface to the annual for 1840 publicly thanked the \"gifted writer\" for\nhis \"valuable aid.\"\n\nAt the beginning of 1839 he went into new rooms vacated by Mr. Meux, and\nset to work finally on \"Salsette and Elephanta.\" He ransacked all\nsources of information, coached himself in Eastern scenery and\nmythology, threw in the Aristotelian ingredients of terror and pity, and\nwound up with an appeal to the orthodoxy of the examiners, of whom Keble\nwas the chief, by prophesying the prompt extermination of Brahminism\nunder the teaching of the missionaries.\n\nThis third try won the prize. Keble sent for him, to make the usual\nemendations before the great work could be given to the world with the\nseal of Oxford upon it. John Ruskin seems to have been somewhat\nrefractory under Keble's hands, though he would let his fellow-students,\nor his father, or Harrison, work their will on his MSS. or proofs; being\nalways easier to lead than to drive. Somehow he came to terms with the\nProfessor, and then the Dean, taking an unexpected interest, was at\npains to see that his printed copy was flawless, and to coach him for\nthe recitation of it at the great day in the Sheldonian (June 12, 1839).\n\nAnd now that friends and strangers, publishers in London and professors\nin Oxford, concurred in their applause, it surely seemed that he had\nfound his vocation, and was well on the high-road to fame as a poet.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE BROKEN CHAIN (1840-1841)\n\n\nThat 8th of February, 1840, when John Ruskin came of age, it seemed as\nthough all the gifts of fortune had been poured into his lap. What his\nfather's wealth and influence could do for him had been supplemented by\na personal charm, which found him friends among the best men of the best\nranks. What his mother's care had done in fortifying his health and\nforming his character, native energy had turned to advantage. He had won\na reputation already much wider and more appreciable, as an artist and\nstudent of science, and as a writer of prose and verse, than\nundergraduates are entitled to expect; and, for crowning mercy, his head\nwas not turned. He was reading extremely hard--\"in\" for his degree\nexamination next Easter term. His college tutor hoped he would get a\nFirst. From that it was an easy step to Holy Orders, and with his\nopportunities preferment was certain.\n\nOn his twenty-first birthday, his father, who had sympathized with his\nadmiration for Turner enough to buy two pictures--the \"Richmond Bridge\"\nand the \"Gosport\"--for their Herne Hill drawing-room, now gave him a\npicture all to himself for his new rooms in St. Aldate's--the\n\"Winchelsea,\" and settled on him a handsome allowance of pocket-money.\nThe first use he made of his wealth was to buy another Turner. In the\nEaster vacation he met Mr. Griffith, the dealer, at the private view of\nthe old Water-colour Society, and hearing that the \"Harlech Castle\" was\nfor sale, he bought it there and then, with the characteristic disregard\nfor money which has always made the vendors of pictures and books and\nminerals find him extremely pleasant to deal with. But as his\nlove-affair had shown his mother how little he had taken to heart her\nchiefest care for him, so this first business transaction was a painful\nawakening to his father, the canny Scotch merchant, who had heaped up\nriches hoping that his son would gather them.\n\nThis \"Harlech Castle\" transaction, however, was not altogether unlucky.\nIt brought him an introduction to the painter, whom he met when he was\nnext in town, at Mr. Griffith's house. He knew well enough the popular\nidea of Turner as a morose and niggardly, inexplicable man. As he had\nseen faults in Turner's painting, so he was ready to acknowledge the\nfaults in his character. But while the rest of the world, with a very\nfew exceptions, dwelt upon the faults, Ruskin had penetration to discern\nthe virtues which they hid. Few passages in his autobiography are more\nstriking than the transcript from his journal of the same evening,\nrecording his first impression:\n\n\n     \"'I found in him a somewhat eccentric, keen-mannered,\n     matter-of-fact, English-minded--gentleman; good-natured evidently,\n     bad-tempered evidently, hating humbug of all sorts, shrewd, perhaps\n     a little selfish, highly intellectual, the powers of the mind not\n     brought out with any delight in their manifestation, or intention\n     of display, but flashing out occasionally in a word or a look.'\n     Pretty close that,\" he adds later, \"and full, to be set down at the\n     first glimpse, and set down the same evening.\"\n\nTurner was not a man to make an intimate of, all at once; the\nacquaintanceship continued, and it ripened into as close a confidence as\nthe eccentric painter's habits of life permitted. He seems to have been\nmore at home with the father than with the son; but even when the young\nman took to writing books about him, he did not, as Carlyle is reported\nto have done in a parallel case, show his exponent to the door.\n\nThe occasion of John Ruskin's coming to town this time was not a\npleasant one--nothing less than the complete breakdown of his health. It\nis true that he was working very hard during this spring; but hard\nreading does not of itself kill people, only when it is combined with\nreal and prolonged mental distress, acting upon a sensitive temperament.\nThe case was thought serious; reading was stopped, and the patient was\nordered abroad for the winter.\n\nFor that summer there was no hurry to be gone; rest was more needed than\nchange, at first. Late in September the same family-party crossed the\nsea to Calais. How different a voyage for them all from the merry\ndepartures of bygone Maytides! Which way should they turn? Not to Paris,\nfor _there_ was the cause of all these ills; so they went straight\nsouthwards, through Normandy to the Loire, and saw the ch\u00e2teaux and\nchurches from Orleans to Tours, famous for their Renaissance\narchitecture and for the romance of their chivalric history. Amboise\nespecially made a strong impression upon the languid and unwilling\ninvalid. It stirred him up to write, in easy verse, the tale of love and\ndeath that his own situation too readily suggested. In \"The Broken\nChain\" he indulged his gloomy fancy, turning, as it was sure to do, into\na morbid nightmare of mysterious horror, not without reminiscence of\nColeridge's \"Christabel.\" But through it all he preserved, so to speak,\nhis dramatic incognito; his own disappointment and his own anticipated\ndeath were the motives of the tale, but treated in such a manner as not\nto betray his secret, nor even to wound the feelings of the lady who now\nwas beyond appeal from an honourable lover--taking his punishment like a\nman.\n\nThis poem lasted him, for private writing, all through that journey--a\nfit emblem of the broken life which it records. A healthier source of\ndistraction was his drawing, in which he had received a fresh impetus\nfrom the exhibition of David Roberts' sketches in the East. More\ndelicate than Prout's work, entering into the detail of architectural\nform more thoroughly, and yet suggesting chiaroscuro with broad washes\nof quiet tone and touches of light, cleverly introduced--\"that\nmarvellous _pop_ of light across the foreground,\" Harding said of the\npicture of the Great Pyramid--these drawings were a mean between the\nlimited manner of Prout and the inimitable fulness of Turner Ruskin took\nup the fine pencil and the broad brush, and, with that blessed habit of\nindustry which has helped so many a one through times of trial, made\nsketch after sketch on the half-imperial board, finished just so far as\nhis strength and time allowed, as they passed from the Loire to the\nmountains of Auvergne; and to the valley of the Rhone, and thence\nslowly round the Riviera to Pisa and Florence and Rome.\n\nHe was not in a mood to sympathize readily with the enthusiasms of other\npeople. They expected him to be delighted with the scenery, the\nbuildings, the picture-galleries of Italy, and to forget himself in\nadmiration. He did admire Michelangelo; and he was interested in the\nback-streets and slums of the cities. Something piquant was needed to\narouse him; the mild ecstasies of common connoisseurship hardly appeal\nto a young man between life and death. He met the friends to whom he had\nbrought introductions--Mr. Joseph Severn, who had been Keats' companion,\nand was afterwards to be the genial Consul at Rome, and the two Messrs.\nRichmond, then studying art in the regular professional way; one of them\nto become a celebrated portrait-painter, and the father of men of mark.\nBut his views on art were not theirs; he was already too independent and\noutspoken in praise of his own heroes, and too sick in mind and body to\nbe patient and to learn.\n\nThey had not been a month in Rome before he took the fever. As soon as\nhe was recovered, they went still farther South, and loitered for a\ncouple of months in the neighbourhood of Naples, visiting the various\nscenes of interest--Sorrento, Amalfi, Salerno. The adventures of this\njourney are partly told in letters to Mr. Dale, and in the \"Letters\naddressed to a College Friend.\"\n\nOn the way to Naples he had noted and sketched the winter scene at La\nRiccia, which he afterwards used for a glowing passage in \"Modern\nPainters\"; and he had ventured into a village of brigands to draw such a\ncastle as he had once imagined in his \"Leoni.\" From Naples he wrote an\naccount of a landslip near Giagnano, and sent it home to the Ashmolean\nSociety. He seemed better; they turned homewards, when suddenly he was\nseized with all the old symptoms worse than ever. After another month at\nRome, they travelled slowly northwards from town to town; spent ten\ndays of May at Venice, and passed through Milan and Turin, and over the\nMont Cenis to Geneva.\n\nAt last he was among the mountains again--the Alps that he loved. It was\nnot only that the air of the Alps braced him, but the spirit of\nmountain-worship stirred him as nothing else could. At last he seemed\nhimself, after more than a year of intense depression; and he records\nthat one day, in church at Geneva, he resolved to _do_ something, to\n_be_ something useful. That he could make such a resolve was a sign of\nreturning health; but if, as I find, he had just been reading Carlyle's\nlately-published lectures on \"Heroes,\" though he did not then accept\nCarlyle's conclusions nor admire his style, might he not, in spite of\nhis criticism, have been spurred the more into energy by that\nenthusiastic gospel of action?\n\nThey travelled home by Basle and Laon; but London in August, and the\npremature attempt to be energetic, brought on a recurrence of the\nsymptoms of consumption, as it was called. He wished to try the\nmountain-cure again, and set out with his friend Richard Fall for a tour\nin Wales. But his father recalled him to Leamington to try iron and\ndieting under Dr. Jephson, who, if he was called a quack, was a sensible\none, and successful in subduing for several years to come the more\nserious phases of the disease. The patient was not cured; he suffered\nfrom time to time from his chest, and still more from a weakness of the\nspine, which during all the period of his early manhood gave him\ntrouble, and finished by bending his tall and lithe figure into\nsomething that, were it not for his face, would be deformity. In 1847 he\nwas again at Leamington under Jephson, in consequence of a relapse into\nthe consumptive symptoms, after which we hear no more of it. He outgrew\nthe tendency, as so many do. But nevertheless the alarm had been\njustifiable, and the malady had left traces which, in one way and\nanother, haunted him ever after; for one of the worst effects of\nillness is to be marked down as an invalid.\n\nAt Leamington, then, in September, 1841, he was finding a new life under\nthe doctor's dieting, and new aims in life, which were eventually to\nresolder for a while the broken chain. Among the Scotch friends of the\nRuskins there was a family at Perth whose daughter came to visit at\nHerne Hill--the Effie Gray whom afterwards he married. She challenged\nthe melancholy John, engrossed in his drawing and geology, to write a\nfairytale, as the least likely task for him to fulfil. Upon which he\nproduced, at a couple of sittings, \"The King of the Golden River,\" a\npretty medley of Grimm's grotesque and Dickens' kindliness and the true\nRuskinian ecstasy of the Alps.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nTHE GRADUATE OF OXFORD (1841-1842)\n\n\nReady for work again, and in reasonable health of mind and body, John\nRuskin sat down in his little study at Herne Hill in November, 1841,\nwith his private tutor, Osborne Gordon. There was eighteen months'\nleeway to make up, and the dates of ancient history, the details of\nschematized Aristotelianism, soon slip out of mind when one is sketching\nin Italy. But he was more serious now about his work, and aware of his\ndeficiencies. To be useful in the world, is it not necessary first to\nunderstand all possible Greek constructions? So said the voice of\nOxford; but our undergraduate was saved, both now and afterwards, from\nthis vain ambition. \"I think it would hardly be worth your while,\" said\nGordon.\n\nHe could not now go in for honours, for the lost year had superannuated\nhim. So in April he went up for a pass. In those times, when a pass-man\nshowed unusual powers, they could give him an honorary class; not a high\nclass, because the range of the examination was less than in the\nhonour-school. This candidate wrote a poor Latin prose, it seems; but\nhis divinity, philosophy, and mathematics were so good that they gave\nhim the best they could--an honorary double fourth--upon which he took\nhis B.A. degree, and could describe himself as \"A Graduate of Oxford.\"\n\nThe continued weakness of his health kept him from taking steps to enter\nthe Church; and his real interest in art was not crowded out even by the\nlast studies for his examination. While he was working with Gordon, in\nthe autumn of 1841, he was also taking lessons from J.D. Harding; and\nthe famous study of ivy, his first naturalistic sketching, to which we\nmust revert, must have been done a week or two before going up for his\nexamination.\n\nThe lessons from Harding were a useful counter-stroke to the excessive\nand exaggerated Turnerism in which he had been indulging through his\nillness. The drawings of Amboise, the coast of Genoa, and the Glacier\ndes Bois, though published later, were made before he had exchanged\nfancy for fact; and they bear, on the face of them, the obvious marks of\nan unhealthy state of mind. Harding, whose robust common-sense and\nbreezy mannerism endeared him to the British amateur of his generation,\nwas just the man to correct any morbid tendency. He had religious views\nin sympathy with his pupil, and he soon inoculated Ruskin with his\ncontempt for the minor Dutch school--those bituminous landscapes, so\nunlike the sparkling freshness that Harding's own water-colour\nillustrated, and those vulgar tavern scenes, painted, he declared, by\nsots who disgraced art alike in their works and in their lives.\n\nUntil this epoch, John Ruskin had found much that interested him in the\nDutch and Flemish painters of the seventeenth century. He had classed\nthem all together as the school of which Rubens, Vandyck and Rembrandt\nwere the chief masters, and those as names to rank with Raphael and\nMichelangelo and Velasquez. He was a humorist, not without boyish\ndelight in a good Sam-Wellerism, and so could be amused with the\n\"drolls,\" until Harding appealed to his religion and morality against\nthem. He was a chiaroscurist, and not naturally offended by their\nviolent light and shade, until George Richmond showed him the more\nexcellent way in colour, the glow of Venice, first hinting it at Rome in\n1840, and then proving it in London in the spring of 1842 from Samuel\nRogers' treasures, of which the chief (now in the National Gallery) was\nthe \"Christ appearing to the Magdalen.\"\n\nMuch as the author of \"Modern Painters\" owed to these friends and\nteachers, and to the advantages of his varied training, he would never\nhave written his great work without a further inspiration. Harding's\nespecial forte was his method of drawing trees. He looked at Nature with\nan eye which, for his period, was singularly fresh and unprejudiced; he\nhad a strong feeling for truth of structure as well as for picturesque\neffect, and he taught his pupils to observe as well as to draw. But in\nhis own practice he rested too much on _having observed_; formed a\nstyle, and copied himself if he did not copy the old masters; Hence he\nheld to rules of composition and conscious graces of arrangement; and\nwhile he taught naturalism in study, he followed it up with teaching\nartifice in practice.\n\nTurner, who was not a drawing-master, lay under no necessity to\nformulate his principles and stick to them. On the contrary, his style\ndeveloped like a kaleidoscope. He had been in Switzerland and on the\nRhine in 1841, \"painting his impressions,\" making water-colour notes\nfrom memory of effects that had struck him. From one of these,\n\"Spl\u00fcgen,\" he had made a finished picture, and now wished to get\ncommissions for more of the same class. Ruskin was greatly interested in\nthis series, because they were not landscapes of the ordinary type,\nscenes from Nature squeezed into the mould of recognised artistic\ncomposition, nor, on the other hand, mere photographic transcripts; but\ndreams, as it were, of the mountains and sunsets, in which Turner's\nwealth of detail was suggested, and his knowledge of form expressed,\ntogether with the unity which comes of the faithful record of a single\nimpression.\n\nThe lesson was soon enforced upon Ruskin's mind by example. One day,\nwhile taking his student's constitutional, he noticed a tree-stem with\nivy upon it, which seemed not ungraceful, and invited a sketch. As he\ndrew he fell into the spirit of its natural arrangement, and soon\nperceived how much finer it was as a piece of design than any\nconventional rearrangement would be. Harding had tried to show him how\nto generalize foliage; but in this example he saw that not\ngeneralization was needed to get its beauty, but truth.\n\nAt Fontainebleau soon after, in much the same circumstances, a study of\nan aspen-tree, idly begun, but carried out with interest and patience,\nconfirmed the principle. At Geneva, once more in the church where he had\nformed such resolutions the year before, the desire came over him with\nrenewed force; now not only to be definitely employed, but to be\nemployed in the service of a definite mission, which was, in art,\nexactly what Carlyle had preached in every other sphere of life in that\nbook of \"Heroes\": the gospel of sincerity.\n\nThe design took shape. At Chamouni he studied plants and rocks and\nclouds, not as an artist to make pictures out of them, nor as a\nscientist to class them and analyze them; but to learn their aspects and\nenter into the spirit of their growth and structure. And though on his\nway home through Switzerland and down the Rhine he made a few drawings\nin his old style for admiring friends, they were the last of the kind\nthat he attempted. Thenceforward his path was marked out; he had found a\nnew vocation. He was not to be a poet--that was too definitely bound up\nwith the past which he wanted to forget, and with conventionalities\nwhich he wished to shake off; not to be an artist, strugging with the\nrest to please a public which he felt himself called upon to teach; not\na man of science, for his botany and geology were to be the means, and\nnot the ends, of his teaching; but the mission was laid upon him to tell\nthe world that Art, no less than other spheres of life, had its Heroes;\nthat the mainspring of their energy was Sincerity, and the burden of\ntheir utterance, Truth.\n\n\n\n\nBOOK II\n\nTHE ART CRITIC\n\n(1842-1860)\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n\"TURNER AND THE ANCIENTS\" (1842-1844)\n\n\nThe neighbour, or the Oxonian friend, who climbed the steps of the Herne\nHill house and called upon Mrs. Ruskin, in the autumn and winter of\n1842, would learn that Mr. John was hard at work in his own study\noverhead. Those were its windows, on the second-floor, looking out upon\nthe front-garden; the big dormer-window above was his bedroom, from\nwhich he had his grand view of lowland, and far horizon, and unconfined\nsky, comparatively clear of London smoke. In the study itself, screened\nfrom the road by russet foliage and thick evergreens, great things were\ngoing on. But Mr. John could be interrupted, would come running lightly\ndownstairs, with both hands out to greet the visitor; would show the\npictures, eagerly demonstrating the beauties of the last new Turners,\n\"Ehrenbreitstein\" and \"Lucerne,\" just acquired, and anticipating the\nsunset glories and mountain gloom of the \"Goldau\" and \"Dazio Grande,\"\nwhich the great artist was \"realizing\" for him from sketches he had\nchosen at Queen Anne Street. He was very busy--but never too busy to see\nhis friends--writing a book. And, the visitor gone, he would run up to\nhis room and his writing.\n\nIn the afternoon his careful mother would turn him out for a tramp round\nthe Norwood lanes; he might look in at the Poussins and Claudes of the\nDulwich Gallery, or, for a longer excursion, go over to Mr. Windus, and\nhis roomful of Turner drawings, or sit to George Richmond for the\nportrait at full length with desk and portfolio, and Mont Blanc in the\nbackground. Dinner over, another hour or two's writing, and early to\nbed, after finishing his chapter with a flourish of eloquence, to be\nread next morning at breakfast to father and mother and Mary. The vivid\ndescriptions of scenes yet fresh in their memory, or of pictures they\ntreasured, the \"thoughts\" as they used to be called, allusions to\nsincere beliefs and cherished hopes, never failed to win the praise that\npleased the young writer most, in happy tears of unrestrained emotion.\nThese old-fashioned folk had not learnt the trick of _nil admirari._\nQuite honestly they would say, with the German musician, \"When I hear\ngood music, then must I always weep.\"\n\nWe can look into the little study and see what this writing was that\nwent on so busily and steadily. It was the long-meditated defence of\nTurner, provoked by _Blackwood's Magazine_ six years before, encouraged\nby Carlyle's \"Heroes,\" and necessitated by the silence, on this topic,\nof the more enlightened leaders of thought in an age of connoisseurship\nand cant.\n\nAnd as the winter ran out, he was ending his work, happy in the applause\nof his little domestic circle, and conscious that he was preaching the\ncrusade of Sincerity, the cause of justice for the greatest landscape\nartist of any age, and justice, at the hands of a heedless public, for\nthe glorious works of the supreme Artist of the universe. Let our young\npainters, he concluded, go humbly to Nature, \"rejecting nothing,\nselecting nothing, and scorning nothing,\" in spite of Academic\ntheorists, and in time we should have a school of landscape worthy of\nthe inspiration they would find.\n\nThere was his book; the title of it, \"Turner and the Ancients.\" Before\npublishing, to get more experienced criticism than that of the\nbreakfast-table, he submitted it to his friend, W.H. Harrison. The\ntitle, it seemed, was not explicit enough, and after debate they\nsubstituted \"Modern Painters: their Superiority in the Art of Landscape\nPainting to all the Ancient Masters proved by Examples of the True, the\nBeautiful, and the Intellectual, from the Works of Modern Artists,\nespecially from those of J.M.W. Turner, Esq., R.A.\" And as the severe\ntone of many remarks was felt to be hardly supported by the age and\nstanding of so young an author, he was content to sign himself \"A\nGraduate of Oxford.\" The book was spoken of, but no part of the copy\nshown, to John Murray, who said he would prefer something about German\nart. It found immediate acceptance with Messrs. Smith and Elder. Young\nRuskin had been doing business for seven years past with that firm; he\nwas well known to them as one of the most \"rising\" youths of the time,\nand their own literary editor, Mr. Harrison, was his private Mentor, who\nrevised his proofs and inserted the punctuation, which he usually\nindicated only by dashes. His dealings with the publishers were\ngenerally conducted through his father, who made very fair terms for\nhim, as things went then.\n\nIn May, 1843, \"Modern Painters,\" vol. i., was published, and it was soon\nthe talk of the art-world. It was meant to be audacious, and naturally\ncreated a storm. The free criticisms of public favourites made an\nimpression, not because they were put into strong language, for the tone\nof the press was stronger then than it is now, as a whole, but because\nthey were backed up by illustration and argument. It was evident that\nthe author knew something of his subject, even if he were all wrong in\nhis conclusions. He could not be neglected, though he might be protested\nagainst, decried, controverted. Artists especially, who do not usually\nsee their works as others see them, and are not accustomed to think of\nthemselves and their school as mere dots and spangles in a perspective\nof history, could not be entirely content to be classed as Turner's\nsatellites. And while the book contained something that promised to suit\nevery kind of reader everyone found something to shock him. Critics were\nscandalized at the depreciation of Claude; the religious were outraged\nat the comparison of Turner, in a passage omitted from later editions,\nto the Angel of the Sun in the Apocalypse.\n\nBut the descriptive passages were such as had never appeared before in\nprose; and the obvious usefulness of the analyses of natural form and\neffect made many an artist read on, while he shook his head. Some\nreadily owned their obligation to the new teacher. Holland, for one,\nwrote to Harrison that he meant to paint the better for the snubbing he\nhad got. Of such as reviewed the book adversely in _Blackwood_ and the\n_Athen\u00e6um_, not one undertook to refute it seriously. They merely\nattacked a detail here and there, which the author discussed in two or\nthree replies, with a patience that showed how confident he was in his\nposition.\n\nHe had the good word of some of the best judges of literature. \"Modern\nPainters\" lay on Rogers' table; and Tennyson, who a few years before had\nbeaten young Ruskin out of the field of poetry, was so taken with it\nthat he wrote to his publisher to borrow it for him, \"as he longed very\nmuch to see it,\" but could not afford to buy it. Sir Henry Taylor wrote\nto Aubrey de Vere, the poet, begging him to read:\n\n\n     \"A book which seems to me to be far more deeply founded in its\n     criticism of art than any other that I have met with ... written\n     with great power and eloquence, and a spirit of the most diligent\n     investigation.... I am told that the author's name is Ruskin, and\n     that he was considered at college as an odd sort of man who would\n     never do anything.\"\n\nA second edition appeared within 12 months. When the secret of the\n\"Oxford Graduate\" leaked out, as it did very soon, through the proud\nfather, Mr. John was lionized. During the winter of 1843 he met\ncelebrities at fashionable dinner-tables; and now that his parents were\nestablished in their grander house on Denmark Hill,[1] they could duly\nreturn the hospitalities of the great world.\n\n[Footnote 1: To which they removed in October, 1842.]\n\nIt was one very satisfactory result of the success that the father was\nmore or less converted to Turnerism, and lined his walls with Turner\ndrawings, which became the great attraction of the house, far outshining\nits seven acres of garden and orchard and shrubbery, and the ampler air\nof cultured ease. For a gift to his son he bought \"The Slave Ship,\" one\nof Turner's latest and most disputed works; and he was all eagerness to\nsee the next volume in preparation.\n\nIt was intended to carry on the discussion of \"Truth,\" with further\nillustrations of mountain-form, trees and skies. And so in May, 1844,\nthey all went away again, that the artist-author might prepare drawings\nfor his plates. He was going to begin with the geology and botany of\nChamouni, and work through the Alps, eastward.\n\nAt Chamouni they had the good fortune to meet with Joseph Coutet, a\nsuperannuated guide, whom they engaged to accompany the eager but\ninexperienced mountaineer. Coutet was one of those men of natural\nability and kindliness whose friendship is worth more than much\nintercourse with worldly celebrities, and for many years afterwards\nRuskin had the advantage of his care--of something more than mere\nattendance. At any rate, under such guidance, he could climb where he\npleased, free from the feeling that people at home were anxious about\nhim.\n\nHe was not unadventurous in his scramblings, but with no ambition to get\nto the top of everything. He wanted to observe the aspects of\nmountain-form; and his careful outlines, slightly coloured, as his\nmanner then was, and never aiming at picturesque treatment, record the\nstructure of the rocks and the state of the snow with more than\nphotographic accuracy. A photograph often confuses the eye with\nunnecessary detail; these drawings seized the leading lines, the\nimportant features, the interesting points. For example, in his\nMatterhorn (a drawing of 1849), as Whymper remarks in \"Scrambles among\nthe Alps,\" there are particulars noted which the mere sketcher neglects,\nbut the climber finds out, on closer intercourse, to be the essential\nfacts of the mountain's anatomy. All this is not picture-making, but it\nis a valuable contribution and preliminary to criticism.\n\nFrom Chamouni this year they went to Simplon, and met J.D. Forbes, the\ngeologist, whose \"viscous theory\" of glaciers Ruskin adopted and\ndefended with warmth later on, and to the Bell' Alp, long before it had\nbeen made a place of popular resort by Professor Tyndall's notice. The\n\"Panorama of the Simplon from the Bell' Alp\" is to be found in the St.\nGeorge's (Ruskin) Museum at Sheffield, as a record of his\ndraughtsmanship in this period. Thence to Zermatt with Osborne Gordon;\nZermatt, too, unknown to the fashionable tourist, and innocent of hotel\nluxuries. It is curious that, at first sight, he did not care for the\nMatterhorn. It was entirely unlike his ideal of mountains. It was not at\nall like Cumberland. But in a very few years he had come to love the\nAlps for their own sake, and we find him regretting at Ambleside the\ncolour and light of Switzerland, the mountain glory which our humbler\nscenery cannot match. And yet he came back to it for a home, not\nill-content.\n\nAfter another visit to Chamouni, he crossed France to Paris, where\nsomething awaited him that upset all his plans, and turned his energies\ninto an unexpected channel.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nCHRISTIAN ART (1845-1847)\n\n\nAt Paris, on the way heme in 1844, he had spent some days in studying\nTitian and Bellini and Perugino. They were not new to him; but now that\nhe was an art-critic, it behoved him to improve his acquaintance with\nthe old masters. \"To admire the works of Pietro Perugino\" was one thing;\nbut to understand them was another, a thing which was hardly attempted\nby \"the Landscape Artists of England\" to whom the author of \"Modern\nPainters\" had so far dedicated his services. He had been extolling\nmodernism, and depreciating \"the Ancients\" because they could not draw\nrocks and clouds and trees; and he was fresh from his scientific\nsketching in the happy hunting-ground of the modern world. A few days in\nthe Louvre made him the devotee of ancient art, and taught him to lay\naside his geology for history.\n\nIn one way the development was easy. The patient attempt to copy\nmountain-form had made him sensitive to harmony of line; and in the\ngreat composers of Florence and Venice he found a quality of abstract\ndesign which tallied with his experience of what was beautiful in\nNature. Aiguilles and glaciers, drawn as he drew them, and the\nfigure-subjects of severe Italian draughtsmen, are beautiful by the same\nlaws of composition, however different the associations they suggest.\n\nBut _he_ had been learning these laws of beauty from Turner and from the\nAlps; how did the ancients come by them? This could be found only in a\nthorough study of their lives and times, to begin with, to which he\ndevoted his winter, with Rio and Lord Lindsay and Mrs. Jameson for his\nauthorities. He found that his foes, Caspar Poussin and Canaletto, and\nthe Dutch landscapists, were not the real old masters; that there had\nbeen a great age of art before the era of Vandyck and Rubens--even before\nMichelangelo and Raphael; and that, towards setting up as a critic of\nthe present, he must understand the past out of which it had grown. So\nhe determined to go to Florence and Venice, and to study the religious\npainters at first hand.\n\nMountain-study and Turner were not to be dropped. For example, to\nexplain the obvious and notorious licences which Turner took with\ntopography, it was necessary to see in what these licences consisted. Of\nthe later Swiss drawings, one of the wildest and most impressive was the\n\"St. Gothard\"; Ruskin wanted to find Turner's point of view, and to see\nwhat alterations he had made. He told Turner so, and the artist, who\nknew that his picture had been realized from a very slight sketch, was\nnaturally rather opposed to this test, as being, from his point of view,\nmerely a waste of time and trouble. He tried to persuade the Ruskins\nthat the Swiss Sonderbund war, then going on, made travelling unsafe,\nand so forth. But in vain. Mr. John was allowed to go, for the first\ntime alone, without his parents, taking only a servant, and meeting the\ntrustworthy Coutet at Geneva.\n\nWith seven months at his own disposal, he did a vast amount of work,\nespecially in drawing. The studies of mountain-form and Italian design,\nin the year before, had given him a greater interest in the \"Liber\nStudiorum,\" Turner's early book of Essays in Composition. He found there\nthat use of the pure line, about which he has since said so much,\ntogether with a thoughtfully devised scheme of light-and-shade in\nmezzotint, devoted to the treatment of landscape in the same spirit as\nthat in which the Italian masters treated figure-subjects in their\npen-and-bistre studies. And just as he had imitated the Rogers vignettes\nin his boyhood, now in his youth he tried to emulate the fine abstract\nflow and searching expressiveness of the etched line, and the studied\nbreadth of shade, by using the quill-pen with washes. At first he kept\npretty closely to monochrome. His object was form, and his special\ntalent was for draughtsmanship rather than for colour. But it was this\nwinter's study of the \"Liber Studiorum\" that started him on his own\ncharacteristic course; and while we have no pen-and-wash work of his\nbefore 1845 (except a few experiments after Prout), we find him now\nusing the pen continually during the \"Modern Painters\" period.\n\nOn reaching the Lake of Geneva he wrote, or sketched, one of his\nbest-known pieces of verse, \"Mont Blanc Revisited,\" and a few other\npoems followed, the last of the long series which had once been his\nchief interest and aim in life. With this lonely journey there came new\nand deeper feelings; with his increased literary power, fresh resources\nof diction; and he was never so near being a poet as when he gave up\nwriting verse. Too condensed to be easily understood, too solemn in\ntheir movement to be trippingly read, the lines on \"The Arve at Cluse,\"\non \"Mont Blanc,\" and \"The Glacier,\" should not be passed over as merely\nrhetorical. And the reflections on the loungers at Conflans (\"Why Stand\nye here all the Day Idle?\") are full of the spirit in which he was\ngradually approaching the great problems of his life, to pass through\nart into the earnest study of human conduct and its final cause.\n\nHe was still deeply religious--more deeply so than before, and found the\necho of his own thoughts in George Herbert, with whom he \"communed in\nspirit\" while he travelled through the Alps. But the forms of outward\nreligion were losing their hold over him in proportion as his inward\nreligion became more real and intense. It was only a few days after\nwriting these lines that he \"broke the Sabbath\" for the first time in\nhis life, by climbing a hill after church. That was the first shot fired\nin a war, in one of the strangest and saddest wars between conscience\nand reason that biography records; strange because the opposing forces\nwere so nearly matched, and sad because the struggle lasted until their\nfield of battle was desolated before either won a victory.\n\nLater on we have to tell how he dwelt in Doubting Castle, and how he\nescaped. But the pilgrim had not yet met Giant Despair; and his progress\nwas very pleasant in that spring of 1845, the year of fine weather, as\nhe drove round the Riviera, and the cities of Tuscany opened out their\ntreasures to him. There was Lucca, with San Frediano and the glories of\nRomanesque architecture; Fra Bartolommeo's picture of the Madonna with\nthe Magdalen and St. Catherine of Siena, his initiation into the\nsignificance of early religious painting: and, taking hold of his\nimagination, in her marble sleep, more powerfully than any flesh and\nblood, the dead lady of St. Martin's Church, Ilaria di Caretto. There\nwas Pisa, with the Campo Santo and the jewel shrine of Sta. Maria della\nSpina, then undestroyed; the excitement of street sketching among a\nsympathetic crowd of fraternizing Italians; the Abb\u00e9 Rosini, Professor\nof Fine Arts, whom he made friends with, endured as lecturer, and\npersuaded into scaffold-building in the Campo Santo for study of the\nfrescoes. And there was Florence, with Giotto's campanile and Santa\nMaria Novella, where the young Protestant frequented monasteries, made\nhay with monks, sketched with his new-found friends Rudolf Durheim of\nBerne and Dieudonn\u00e9 the French purist; and spent long days copying\nAngelico and annotating Ghirlandajo, fevered with the sun of Italy at\nits strongest, and with the rapture of discovery, \"which turns the\nunaccustomed head like Chianti wine.\"\n\nCoutet got him away, at last, to the Alps; worn out and in despondent\nreaction after all this excitement. He spent a month at Macugnaga,\nreading Shakespeare and trying to draw boulders; drifting gradually back\ninto strength enough to attack the next piece of work, the study of\nTurner sites on the St. Gothard, where he made the drawings afterwards\nengraved in \"Modern Painters.\" In August, J.D. Harding was going to\nVenice, and arranged for a meeting at Baveno, on the Lago Maggiore.\nGossip had credited him with a share in \"Modern Painters\"; now the\ntables were turned, and Griffith, the picture-dealer, wanted to know if\nit was true that John Ruskin had helped Harding with his new book, just\nout. They sketched together, Ruskin perhaps emulating his friend's\nslap-dash style in the \"Sunset\" reproduced in his \"Poems,\" and\nillustrating his own in the \"Water-mill.\" And so they drove together to\nVerona and thence to Venice.\n\nAt Venice they stayed in Danieli's Hotel, on the Riva dei Schiavoni, and\nbegan by studying picturesque canal-life. Mr. Boxall, R.A., and Mrs.\nJameson, the historian of Sacred and Legendary Art, were their\ncompanions. Another old friend, Joseph Severn, had in 1843 gained one of\nthe prizes at the Westminster Hall Cartoons Competition; and a letter\nfrom Ruskin, referring to the work there, shows how he still pondered on\nthe subject that had been haunting him in the Alps:\n\n\n     \"With your hopes for the elevation of English art by means of\n     fresco I cannot sympathize.... It is not the material nor the space\n     that can give us thoughts, passions, or power. I see on our Academy\n     walls nothing but what is ignoble in small pictures, and would be\n     disgusting in large ones.... It is not the love of fresco that we\n     want; it is the love of God and His creatures; it is humility, and\n     charity, and self-denial, and fasting, and prayer; it is a total\n     change of character. We want more faith and less reasoning, less\n     strength and more trust. You want neither walls, nor plaster, nor\n     colours--_\u00e7a ne fait rien \u00e0 l'affaire_; it is Giotto, and\n     Ghirlandajo, and Angelico that you want, and that you will and must\n     want until this disgusting nineteenth century has--I can't say\n     breathed, but steamed its last.\"\n\nSo early he had taken up and wrapped round him the mantle of Cassandra.\n\nBut he was suddenly to find the sincerity of Ghirlandajo and the\nreligious significance of Angelico united with the matured power of art.\nWithout knowing what they were to meet, Harding and he found themselves\none day in the Scuola di S. Rocco, and face to face with Tintoret.\n\nIt was the fashion earlier, and it has been the fashion since, to\nundervalue Tintoret. He is not pious enough for the purists, nor\ndecorative enough for the Pre-Raphaelites. The ruin or the restoration\nof almost all his pictures makes it impossible for the ordinary amateur\nto judge them; they need reconstruction in the mind's eye, and that is a\ndangerous process. Ruskin himself, as he grew older, found more interest\nin the playful industry of Carpaccio than in the laborious games, the\nstupendous Titan feats of Tintoret. But at this moment, solemnized\nbefore the problems of life, he found these problems hinted in the\nmystic symbolism of the School of S. Rocco; with eyes now opened to\npre-Reformation Christianity, he found its completed outcome in\nTintoret's interpretation of the life of Christ and the types of the Old\nTestament; fresh from the stormy grandeur of the St. Gothard, he found\nthe lurid skies and looming giants of the Visitation, or the Baptism, or\nthe Crucifixion, re-echoing the subjects of Turner as \"deep answering to\ndeep\"; and, with Harding of the Broad Brush, he recognised the mastery\nof landscape execution in the Flight into Egypt, and the St. Mary in the\nDesert.\n\nHe devoted the rest of his time chiefly to cataloguing and copying\nTintoret. The catalogue appeared in \"Stones of Venice,\" which was\nsuggested by this visit, and begun by some sketches of architectural\ndetail, and the acquisition of daguerreotypes--a new invention which\ndelighted him immensely, as it had delighted Turner, with trustworthy\nrecords of detail which sometimes eluded even his industry and accuracy.\n\nAt last his friends were gone; and, left alone, he overworked himself,\nas usual, before leaving Venice with crammed portfolios and\nclosely-written notebooks. At Padua he was stopped by a fever; all\nthrough France he was pursued by what, from his account, appears to have\nbeen some form of diphtheria, averted only, as he believed, in direct\nanswer to earnest prayer. At last his eventful pilgrimage was ended, and\nhe was restored to his home and his parents. It was not long before he\nwas at work again in his new study, looking out upon the quiet meadow\nand grazing cows of Denmark Hill, and rapidly throwing into form the\nfresh impressions of the summer. He was strongly influenced by the\nsermons of Canon Melvill--the same preacher whom Browning in his youth\nadmired--a good orator and sound analytic expositor, though not a great\nor independent thinker. Osborne Gordon had recommended him to read\nHooker, and he caught the tone and style of the \"Ecclesiastical Polity\"\nonly too readily, so that much of his work of that winter, the more\nphilosophical part of vol. ii., was damaged by inversions, and\nElizabethan quaintness as of ruff and train, long epexegetical\nsentences, and far-sought pomposity of diction. It was only when he had\nwaded through the chaos which he set himself to survey, that he could\nlay aside his borrowed stilts, and stand on his own feet in the Tintoret\ndescriptions--rather stiff, yet, from foregone efforts.\n\nThis volume, like the first, was completed in the winter, in one long\nspell of hard work, broken only by a visit to Oxford in January as the\nguest of Dr. Greswell, Head of Worcester, at a conference for the\npromotion of art. Smith and Elder accepted the book on Mr. J.J. Ruskin's\nterms (so his wife wrote), for they had already reported it as called\nfor by the public. The first volume was going into a third edition.\n\nWhen his book came out he was away again in Italy, trying to show his\nfather all that he had seen in the Campo Santo and Giotto's Tower, and\nto explain \"why it more than startled him.\" The good man hardly felt the\nforce of it all at once. And there were little passages of arms and some\nheart-quaking and head-shaking, until Mr. Dale, the old schoolmaster,\nwrote that he had heard no less a man than Sydney Smith mention the new\nbook in public, in the presence of \"distinguished literary characters,\"\nas a work of \"transcendent talent, presenting the most original views,\nin the most elegant and powerful language, which would work a complete\nrevolution in the world of taste.\" When he returned home it was to find\na respectful welcome. His word on matters of Art was now really worth\nsomething, and before long it was called for. The National Gallery was\ncomparatively in its infancy. It had been established less than\ntwenty-five years, and its manager, Mr. Eastlake (afterwards Sir\nCharles), had his hands full, what with rascally dealers in forged old\nmasters, and incompetent picture-cleaners; and an economical Government,\nand a public that neither knew its own mind nor trusted his judgment. A\ngreat outcry was set up against him for buying bad works, and spoiling\nthe best by restoration. Ruskin wrote very temperately to _The Times_,\npointing out that the damage had been slight compared with what was\nbeing done everywhere else, and suggesting that, prevention being better\nthan cure, the pictures should be put under glass, for then they would\nnot need the recurring attentions of the restorer. But he blamed the\nmanagement for spending large sums on added examples of Guido and\nRubens, while they had no Angelico, no Ghirlandajo, no good Perugino,\nonly one Bellini, and, in a word, left his new friends, the early\nChristian artists, unrepresented. He suggested that pictures might be\npicked up for next to nothing in Italy; and he begged that the\ncollection might be made historical and educational by being fully\nrepresentative, and chronologically arranged.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\n\"THE SEVEN LAMPS\"\n\n\n\"Have you read an Oxford Graduate's letters on art?\" wrote Miss Mitford,\nof \"Our Village,\" on January 27, 1847. \"The author, Mr. Ruskin, was here\nlast week, and is certainly the most charming person that I have ever\nknown.\" The friendship thus begun lasted until her death. She encouraged\nhim in his work; she delighted in his success; and, in the grave\nreverses which were to befall him, he found her his most faithful\nsupporter and most sympathetic consoler. In return, \"his kindness\ncheered her closing days; he sent her every book that would interest and\nevery delicacy that would strengthen her, attentions which will not\nsurprise those who have heard of his large and thoughtful\ngenerosity.\"[2]\n\n[Footnote 2: \"The Friendships of Mary Russell Mitford,\" edited by the\nRev. A.G. L'Estrange.]\n\nIt was natural that a rising man, so closely connected with Scotland,\nshould be welcomed by the leaders of the Scottish school of literature.\nSydney Smith, a former Edinburgh professor, had praised the new volume.\nJohn Murray, as it seems from letters of the period, made overtures to\nsecure the author as a contributor to his Italian guide-books. Lockhart\nemployed him to write for the _Quarterly Review_.\n\nLockhart was a person of great interest for young Ruskin, who worshipped\nScott; and Lockhart's daughter, even without her personal charm, would\nhave attracted him as the actual grandchild of the great Sir Walter. It\nwas for her sake, he says, rather than for the honour of writing in the\nfamous _Quarterly_, that he undertook to review Lord Lindsay's\n\"Christian Art.\"\n\nHe was known to be a suitor for Miss Lockhart's hand. His father, in\nview of the success he desired, had been in February looking out for a\nhouse in the Lake District; hoping, no doubt, to see him settled there\nas a sort of successor to Wordsworth and Christopher North. In March,\nJohn Ruskin betook himself to the Salutation at Ambleside, with his\nconstant attendant and amanuensis George, for quiet after a tiring\nwinter in London society, and for his new labour of reviewing. But he\ndid not find himself so fond of the Lakes as of old. He wrote to his\nmother (Sunday, March 28, 1847):\n\n\n     \"I finished--and sealed up--and addressed--my last bit of work,\n     last night by ten o'clock--ready to send by to-day's post--so that\n     my father should receive it with this. I could not at all have done\n     it had I stayed at home: for even with all the quiet here, I have\n     had no more time than was necessary. For exercise, I find the\n     rowing very useful, though it makes me melancholy with thinking of\n     1838,--and the lake, when it is quite calm, is wonderfully sad and\n     quiet:--no bright colours--no snowy peaks. Black water--as still as\n     death;--lonely, rocky islets--leafless woods,--or worse than\n     leafless--the brown oak foliage hanging dead upon them; gray\n     sky;--far-off, wild, dark, dismal moorlands; no sound except the\n     rustling of the boat among the reeds.\n\n     \"_One o'clock._--I have your kind note and my father's, and am very\n     thankful that you like what I have written, for I did not at all\n     know myself whether it were good or bad.\"\n\nIn the early summer he went to Oxford, for a meeting of the British\nAssociation. He said (June 27, 1847):\n\n\n     \"I am not able to write a full account of all I see, to amuse you,\n     for I find it necessary to keep as quiet as I can, and I fear it\n     would only annoy you to be told of all the invitations I refuse,\n     and all the interesting matters in which I take no part. There is\n     nothing for it but throwing one's self into the stream, and going\n     down with one's arms under water, ready to be carried anywhere, or\n     do anything. My friends are all busy, and tired to death. All the\n     members of my section, but especially (Edward) Forbes, Sedgwick,\n     Murchison, and Lord Northampton--and of course Buckland, are as\n     kind to me as men can be; but I am tormented by the perpetual sense\n     of my unmitigated ignorance, for I know no more now than I did when\n     a boy, and I have only one perpetual feeling of being in\n     everybody's way. The recollections of the place, too, and the being\n     in my old rooms, make me very miserable. I have not one moment of\n     profitably spent time to look back to while I was here, and much\n     useless labour and disappointed hope; and I can neither bear the\n     excitement of being in the society where the play of mind is\n     constant, and rolls _over_ me like heavy wheels, nor the pain of\n     being alone. I get away in the evenings into the hayfields about\n     Cumnor, and rest; but then my failing sight plagues me. I cannot\n     look at anything as I used to do, and the evening sky is covered\n     with swimming strings and eels. My best time is while I am in the\n     Section room, for though it is hot, and sometimes wearisome, yet I\n     have nothing to _say_,--little to do,--nothing to look at, and as\n     much as I like to hear.\"\n\nHe had to undergo a second disappointment in love; his health broke down\nagain, and he was sent to Leamington to his former doctor, Jephson, once\nmore a \"consumptive\" patient. Dieted into health, he went to Scotland\nwith a new-found friend, William Macdonald Macdonald of Crossmount. But\nhe had no taste for sport, and could make little use of his\nopportunities for distraction and relaxation. One battue was enough for\nhim, and the rest of the visit was spent in morbid despondency, digging\nthistles, and brooding over the significance of the curse of Eden, so\nstrangely now interwoven with his own life--\"Thorns a also and\nThistles.\"\n\nAt Bower's Well, Perth, where his grandparents had spent their later\nyears, and where his parents had been married, lived Mr. George Gray, a\nlawyer, and an old acquaintance of the Ruskin family. His daughter\nEuphemia used to visit at Denmark Hill. It was for her that, some years\nearlier, \"The King of the Golden River\" had been written. She had grown\nup into a perfect Scotch beauty, with every gift of health and spirits\nwhich would compensate--the old folk thought--for his retiring and\nmorbid nature. They were anxious, now more than ever, to see him\nsettled. They pressed him, in letters still extant, to propose. We have\nseen how he was situated, and can understand how he persuaded himself\nthat fortune, after all, was about to smile upon him. Her family had\ntheir own reasons for promoting the match, and all united in hastening\non the event.\n\nIn the Notes to Exhibitions added to a new edition of \"Modern Painters,\"\nthen in the Press, the author mentions a \"hurried visit to Scotland in\nthe spring\" of 1848. This was the occasion of his marriage at Perth, on\nApril 10. The young couple spent rather more than a fortnight on the way\nSouth, among Scotch and English lakes, intending to make a more extended\ntour in the summer to the cathedrals and abbeys.\n\nThe pilgrimage began with Salisbury, where a few days' sketching in the\ndamp and draughts of the cathedral laid the bridegroom low, and brought\nthe tour to an untimely end. In August, the young people were seen\nsafely off to Normandy, where they went by easy stages from town to\ntown, studying the remains of Gothic building. In October they returned\nand settled in a house of their own, at 31, Park Street, where during\nthe winter he wrote \"The Seven Lamps of Architecture,\" and, as a bit of\nby-work, a notice of Samuel Prout for the _Art Journal._\n\nThis was Ruskin's first illustrated volume. The plates were engraved by\nhimself in soft-ground etching, such as Prout had used, from drawings he\nhad made in 1846 and 1848. Some are scrappy combinations of various\ndetail, but others, such as the Byzantine capital, the window in\nGiotto's Campanile, the arches from St. Lo in Normandy, from St. Michele\nat Lucca, and from the Ca' Foscari at Venice, are effective studies of\nthe actual look of old buildings, seen as they are shown us in Nature,\nwith her light and the shade added to all the facts of form, and her own\nlast touches in the way of weather-softening, and settling-faults, and\ntufted, nestling plants.\n\nRevisiting the H\u00f4tel de la Cloche at Dijon in later years, Ruskin showed\nme the room where he had \"bitten\" the last plate in his wash-hand basin,\nas a careless makeshift for the regular etcher's bath. He was not\ndissatisfied with his work himself; the public of the day wanted\nsomething more finished. So the second edition appeared with the\nsubjects elaborately popularized in fashionable engraving. More recently\nthey have undergone reduction for a cheap issue. But any book lover\nknows the value of the original \"Seven Lamps\" with its San Miniato cover\nand autograph plates.\n\nAs to its reception, or at least the anticipation of it. Charlotte\nBronte bears witness in a letter to the publishers.\n\n\"I congratulate you on the approaching publication of Mr. Ruskin's new\nwork. If 'The Seven Lamps of Architecture' resemble their predecessor,\n'Modern Painters,' they will be no lamps at all, but a new\nconstellation,--seven bright stars, for whose rising the reading world\nought to be anxiously agape.\"\n\nThe book was announced for his father's birthday, May 10, 1849, and it\nappeared while they were among the Alps. The earlier part of this tour\nis pretty fully described in \"Pr\u00e6terita,\" II. xi., and \"Fors,\" letter\nxc., and so the visit of Richard Fall, the meeting with Sibylla Dowie,\nand the death of cousin Mary need not be dwelt on here. From the letters\nthat passed between father and son we find that Mr. John had been given\na month's leave from July 26 to explore the Higher Alps, with Coutet his\nguide and George his valet. The old people stayed at the H\u00f4tel des\nBergues, and thought of little else but their son and his affairs,\nlooking eagerly from day to day for the last news, both of him and of\nhis book.\n\nMr. Ruskin, senior, writes from Geneva on July 29:\n\n\n     \"Miss Tweddale says your book _has made a great sensation._\" On\n     August 4: \"The _Spectator_, which Smith sets great value on, has an\n     elaborate favourable notice on 'Seven Lamps,' only ascribing an\n     _infirmity_ of temper, quoting railroad passage in proof. Anne was\n     told by American family servant that you were in American Paper,\n     and got it for us, the _New York Tribune_ of July 13; first article\n     is your book. They say they are willing to be learners from, rather\n     than critics of, such a book, etc. The _Daily News_ (some of the\n     _Punch_ people's paper) has a capital notice. It begins: 'This is a\n     masked battery of seven pieces, which blaze away to the total\n     extinction of the small architectural lights we may boast of, etc.,\n     etc.'\" On August 5: \"I have, at a shameful charge of ten francs,\n     got August magazine and Dickens, quite a prohibition for parcels\n     from England. In _British Quarterly_, under \u00e6sthetics of Gothic\n     architecture they take four works, you first.... As a critic they\n     almost rank you with Goethe and Coleridge, and in style with Jeremy\n     Taylor.\"\n\nThe qualified encouragement of these remarks was further qualified with\ndetailed advice about health; and warnings against the perils of the\nway, to which Mr. John used to answer on this wise:\n\n\n     \"CORMAYEUR, _Sunday afternoon (July_ 29, 1849).\n\n     \"MY DEAREST FATHER,\n\n     \"(Put the three sheets in order first, 1, 2, 3, then read this,\n     front and _back_, and then 2, and then 3, front and back.) You and\n     my mother were doubtless very happy when you saw the day clear up\n     as you left St. Martin's. Truly it was impossible that any day\n     could be more perfect towards its close. We reached Nant Bourant at\n     twelve o'clock, or a little before, and Coutet having given his\n     sanction to my wish to get on, we started again soon after one--and\n     reached the top of the Col de Bonhomme about five. You would have\n     been delighted with that view--it is one upon those lovely seas of\n     blue mountain, one behind the other, of which one never\n     tires--this, fortunately, westward--so that all the blue ridges and\n     ranges above Conflans and Beaufort were dark against the afternoon\n     sky, though misty with its light; while eastward a range of snowy\n     crests, of which the most important was the Mont Iseran, caught the\n     sunlight full upon them. The sun was as warm, and the air as mild,\n     on the place where the English travellers sank and perished, as in\n     our garden at Denmark Hill on the summer evenings. There is,\n     however, no small excuse for a man's losing courage on that pass,\n     if the weather were foul. I never saw one so literally pathless--so\n     void of all guide and help from the lie of the ground--so\n     embarrassing from the distance which one has to wind round mere\n     brows of craggy precipice without knowing the direction in which\n     one is moving, while the path is perpetually lost in heaps of\n     shale or among clusters of crags, even when it is free of snow.\n     All, however, when I passed was serene, and even beautiful--owing\n     to the glow which the red rocks had in the sun. We got down to\n     Chapiu about seven--itself one of the most desolately-placed\n     villages I ever saw in the Alps. Scotland is in no place that I\n     have seen, so barren or so lonely. Ever since I passed Shapfells,\n     when a child, I have had an excessive love for this kind of\n     desolation, and I enjoyed my little square chalet window and my\n     chalet supper exceedingly (mutton with garlic).\"\n\nHe then confesses that he woke in the night with a sore throat, but\nstruggled on next day down the All\u00e9e Blanche to Cormayeur.\n\n\n     \"I never saw such a mighty heap of stones and dust. The glacier\n     itself is quite invisible from the road (and I had no mind for\n     extra work or scrambling), except just at the bottom, where the ice\n     appears in one or two places, being exactly of the colour of the\n     heaps of waste coal at the Newcastle pits, and admirably adapted\n     therefore to realize one's brightest anticipations of the character\n     and style of the All\u00e9e _Blanche_.\n\n     \"The heap of its moraine conceals, for the two miles of its extent,\n     the entire range of Mont Blanc from the eye. At last you weather\n     the mighty promontory, cross the torrent which issues from its\n     base, and find yourself suddenly at the very foot of the vast slope\n     of torn granite, which from a point not 200 feet lower than the\n     summit of Mont Blanc, sweeps down into the valley of Cormayeur.\n\n     \"I am quite unable to speak with justice--or think with\n     clearness--of this marvellous view. One is so unused to see a mass\n     like that of Mont Blanc without any snow that all my ideas and\n     modes of estimating size were at fault. I only felt overpowered by\n     it, and that--as with the porch of Rouen Cathedral--look as I\n     would, I could not _see_ it. I had not mind enough to grasp it or\n     meet it. I tried in vain to fix some of its main features on my\n     memory; then set the mules to graze again, and took my sketch-book,\n     and marked the outlines--but where is the use of marking contours\n     of a mass of endless--countless--fantastic rock--12,000 feet sheer\n     above the valley? Besides, one cannot have sharp sore-throat for\n     twelve hours without its bringing on some slight feverishness; and\n     the scorching Alpine sun to which we had been exposed without an\n     instant's cessation from the height of the col till now--i.e., from\n     half-past ten to three--had not mended the matter; my pulse was now\n     beginning slightly to quicken and my head slightly to ache--and my\n     impression of the scene is feverish and somewhat painful; I should\n     think like yours of the valley of Sixt.\"\n\nSo he finished his drawing, tramped down the valley after his mule, in\ndutiful fear of increasing his cold, and found Cormayeur crowded, only\nan attic _au quatri\u00e8me_ to be had. After trying to doctor himself with\ngray pill, kali, and senna, Coutet cured his throat with an alum gargle,\nand they went over the Col Ferret.\n\nThe courier Pfister had been sent to meet him at Martigny, and bring\nlatest news and personal report, on the strength of which several days\npassed without letters, but not without a remonstrance from\nheadquarters. On August 8 he writes from Zermatt:\n\n\n     \"I have your three letters, with pleasant accounts of critiques,\n     etc., and painful accounts of your anxieties. I certainly never\n     thought of putting in a letter at Sion, as I arrived there about\n     three hours after Fister left me, it being only two stages from\n     Martigny; and besides, I had enough to do that morning in thinking\n     what I should want at Zermatt, and was engaged at Sion, while we\n     changed horses, in buying wax candles and rice. It was unlucky that\n     I lost post at Visp,\" etc.\n\nA few days later he says:\n\n\n     \"On Friday I had such a day as I have only once or twice had the\n     like of among the Alps. I got up to a promontory projecting from\n     the foot of the Matterhorn, and lay on the rocks and drew it at my\n     ease. I was about three hours at work as quietly as if in my study\n     at Denmark Hill, though on a peak of barren crag above a glacier,\n     and at least 9,000 feet above sea. But the Matterhorn, after all,\n     is not so fine a thing as the aiguille Dru, nor as any one of the\n     aiguilles of Chamouni: for one thing, it is all of secondary rock\n     in horizontal beds, quite rotten and shaly; but there are other\n     causes of difference in impressiveness which I am endeavouring to\n     analyze, but find considerable embarrassment in doing so. There\n     seems no sufficient reason why an isolated obelisk, one-fourth\n     higher than any of them, should not be at least as sublime as they\n     in their dependent grouping; but it assuredly is not. For this\n     reason, as well as because I have not found here the near studies\n     of primitive rock I expected,--for to my great surprise, I find the\n     whole group of mountains, mighty as they are, except the\n     inaccessible Monte Rosa, of secondary limestones or slates,--I\n     should like, if it were possible, to spend a couple of days more on\n     the Montanvert, and at the bases of the Chamouni aiguilles,\n     sleeping at the Montanvert.\"\n\nAnd so on, apologetically begging (as other sons beg money) for _time_,\nto gather the material of \"Modern Painters,\" volume iv.\n\n\"I hope you will think whether the objects you are after are worth risks\nof sore throats or lungs,\" replied his father, for he had \"personified a\nperpetual influenza\" until they got him to Switzerland, and they were\nvery anxious; indeed, Pfister's news from Martigny had scared his\nmother--not very well herself--into wild plans for recapturing him.\nHowever, Osborne Gordon was going to Chamouni with Mr. Pritchard, and so\nthey gave him a little longer; and he made the best use of his time:\n\n\n     \"_Monday evening (August_ 20, 1849).\n\n     \"MY DEAREST FATHER,\n\n     \"I have to-night a packet of back letters from Vi\u00e8ge ... but I have\n     really hardly time to read them to-night, I had so many notes to\n     secure when I came from the hills. I walk up every day to the base\n     of the aiguilles without the slightest sense of fatigue; work there\n     all day hammering and sketching; and down in the evening. As far as\n     days by myself can be happy they are so, for I love the place with\n     all my heart. I have no over-fatigue or labour, and plenty of time.\n     By-the-by, though in most respects they are incapable of\n     improvement, I recollect that I thought to-day, as I was breaking\n     last night's ice away from the rocks of which I wanted a specimen,\n     with a sharpish wind and small pepper and salt-like sleet beating\n     in my face, that a hot chop and a glass of sherry, if they were to\n     be had round the corner, would make the thing more perfect. There\n     was however nothing to be had round the corner but some Iceland\n     moss, which belonged to the chamois, and an extra allowance of\n     north wind.\"\n\nThis next is scribbled on a tiny scrap of paper:\n\n\n     \"GLACIER or GREPPOND, _August_ 21.\n\n     \"MY DEAREST FATHER,\n\n     \"I am sitting on a gray stone in the middle of the glacier, waiting\n     till the fog goes away. I believe I _may_ wait. I write this line\n     in my pocket-book to thank my mother for hers which I did not\n     acknowledge last night. I am glad and sorry that she depends so\n     much on my letters for her comfort. I am sending them now every day\n     by the people who go down, for the diligence is stopped. You may\n     run the chance of missing one or two therefore. I am quite well,\n     and very comfortable--sitting on Joseph's knapsack laid on the\n     stone. The fog is about as thick as that of London in\n     November,--only white; and I see nothing near me but fields of\n     dampish snow with black stones in it.\"\n\nAnd then:\n\n\n     \"MONTANVERT, _August_ 22.\n\n     \"I cannot say that on the whole the aiguilles have treated me well.\n     I went up Saturday, Monday and Tuesday to their feet, and never\n     obtained audience until to-day, and then they retired at twelve\n     o'clock; but I have got a most valuable memorandum.\"\n\nThe parental view was put thus:\n\n\n     GENEVA, _Monday, August_ 20, 1849.\n\n     \"MY DEAREST JOHN,\n\n     \"I do not know if you have got all my letters, fully explaining to\n     you in what way the want of a _single_ letter, on two occasions,\n     did _so_ much mischief--made such havoc in our peace. I think my\n     last Thursday's letter entered on it. We are grateful for many\n     letters--that have come. It was merely the accident of the moment\n     when first by illness and then by precipices we were most\n     anxious--being exactly the moment the letters took it into their\n     heads to be not forthcoming. Not writing so often would only keep\n     us more in the dark, with little less anxiety. Please say if you\n     get a letter every day....\"\n\nSpace can hardly be afforded for more than samples of this voluminous\ncorrespondence, or interesting quotations might be given about the\n\"ghost-hunt yesterday and a crystal-hunt to-day,\" and life at the\nMontanvert, until at last (August 28):\n\n\n     \"I have taken my place in diligence for Thursday, and hope to be\n     with you in good time. But I quite feel as if I were leaving home\n     to go on a journey. I shall not be melancholy, however, for I have\n     really had a good spell of it.... Dearest love to my mother. I\n     don't intend to write again.\n\n     \"Ever, my dearest father,\n\n     \"Your most affectionate son,\n\n     \"J. RUSKIN.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\n\"STONES OF VENICE\" (1849-1851)\n\n\nA book about Venice had been planned in 1845, during Ruskin's first long\nworking visit. He had made so many notes and sketches both of\narchitecture and painting that the material seemed ready to hand;\nanother visit would fill up the gaps in his information; and two or\nthree months' hard writing would work the subject off, and set him free\nto continue \"Modern Painters.\" So before leaving home in 1849, he had\nmade up his mind that the next work would be \"The Stones of Venice,\"\nwhich, on the appearance of \"The Seven Lamps,\" was announced by the\npublishers as in preparation.\n\nHe left home again early in October; by the end of November he was\nsettled with his wife at H\u00f4tel Danieli, Venice, for the winter. He\nexpected to find without much trouble all the information he wanted as\nto the dates, styles and history of Venetian buildings; but after\nconsulting and comparing all the native writers, it appeared that the\nquestions he asked of them were just the questions they were unprepared\nto answer, and that he must go into the whole matter afresh. So he laid\nhimself out that winter for a thorough examination of St. Mark's and the\nDucal Palace and the other remains--drawing, and measuring, and\ncomparing their details.\n\nHis father had gone back to England in September out of health, and the\nletters from home did not report improvement. His mother, too, was\nbeginning to fear the loss of her sight; and he could not stay away from\nthem any longer. In February, 1850, he broke off his work in the middle\nof it, and returned to London. The rest of the year he spent in writing\nthe first volume of \"Stones of Venice,\" and in preparing the\nillustrations, together with \"Examples of the Architecture of Venice,\" a\nportfolio of large lithographs and engravings in mezzotint and line, to\naccompany the work. It was most fortunate for Ruskin that his drawings\ncould be interpreted by such men as Armytage and Cousen, Cuff and Le\nKeux, Boys and Lupton, and not without advantage to them that their\nmasterpieces should be preserved in his works, and praised as they\ndeserved in his prefaces. But these plates for \"Stones of Venice\" were\nin advance of the times. The publisher thought them \"caviare to the\ngeneral,\" so Mr. J.J. Ruskin told his son; but gave it as his own belief\nthat \"some dealers in Ruskins and Turners in 1890 will get great prices\nfor what at present will not sell.\"\n\nEarly in 1850, his father, at his mother's desire, and with the help of\nW.H. Harrison, collected and printed his poems, with a number of pieces\nthat still remained in MS., the author taking no part in this revival of\nbygones, which, for the sake of their associations, he was not anxious\nto recall--though his father still believed that he _might_ have been a\npoet, and _ought_ to have been one. This is the volume of \"Poems J.R.,\n1850,\" so highly valued by collectors.\n\nAnother resurrection was \"The King of the Golden River,\" which had lain\nhidden for the nine years of the Ars Poetica. He allowed it to be\npublished, with woodcuts by the famous \"Dicky\" Doyle. The little book\nran through three editions that year. The first issue must have been\ntorn to rags in the nurseries of the last generation, since copies are\nso rare as to have brought ten guineas apiece instead of the six\nshillings at which they were advertised in 1850.\n\nA couple of extracts from letters of 1850 will give some idea of\nRuskin's impressions of London society and the Drawing Room:\n\n\n     \"MY DEAREST MOTHER,\n\n     \"Horrible party last night--stiff--large--dull--fidgety--strange,\n     --run-against-everybody-know-nobody sort of party. Naval people.\n     Young lady claims acquaintance with me--I know as much of her as\n     of Queen Pomare--Talk: get away as soon as I can--ask who she\n     is--Lady (----);--as wise as I was before. Introduced to a black\n     man with chin in collar. Black man condescending--I abuse\n     different things to black man: chiefly the House of Lords. Black\n     man says he lives in it--asks where I live--don't want to tell\n     him--obliged--go away and ask who he is--(----); as wise as I was\n     before. Introduced to a young lady--young lady asks if I like\n     drawing--so away and ask who she is--Lady(----). Keep away, with\n     back to wall and look at watch. Get away at last. Very sulky this\n     morning--hope my father better--dearest love to you both.\"\n\n\n     \"PARK STREET, _4 o'clock, (May, 1850)_.\n\n     \"MY DEAREST FATHER,\n\n     \"We got through gloriously, though at one place there was the most\n     awkward crush I ever saw in my life--the pit at the Surrey, which I\n     never saw, may perhaps show the like--nothing else. The floor was\n     covered with the ruins of ladies' dresses, torn lace and fallen\n     flowers. But Effie was luckily out of it, and got through\n     unscathed--and heard people saying 'What a beautiful dress!' just\n     as she got up to the Queen. It was fatiguing enough but not so\n     _awkward_ as I expected....\n\n     \"The Queen looked much younger and prettier than I expected--very\n     like her pictures, even like those which are thought to flatter\n     most--but I only saw the profile--I could not see the front face as\n     I knelt to her, at least without an upturning of the eyes which I\n     thought would be unseemly--and there were but some two or three\n     seconds allowed for the whole affair....\n\n     \"The Queen gave her hand very graciously: but looked bored; poor\n     thing, well she might be, with about a quarter of a mile square of\n     people to bow to.\n\n     \"I met two people whom I have not seen for many a day, Kildare and\n     Scott Murray--had a chat with the former and a word with Murray,\n     but nothing of interest....\"\n\nAs one of the chief literary figures of the day, Ruskin could not avoid\nsociety, and, as he tells in \"Pr\u00e6terita,\" he was rewarded for the\nreluctant performance of his duties by meeting with several who became\nhis lifelong friends. Chief among these he mentions Mr. and Mrs.\nCowper-Temple, afterwards Lord and Lady Mount Temple. The acquaintance\nwith Samuel Rogers, inauspiciously begun many years before, now ripened\ninto something like friendship; Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton) and\nother men of letters were met at Rogers' breakfasts. A little later a\nvisit to the Master of Trinity, Whewell, at Cambridge, brought him into\ncontact with Professer Willis, the authority on Gothic architecture, and\nother notabilities of the sister University. There also he met Mr. and\nMrs. Marshall of Leeds (and Coniston); and he pursued his journey to\nLincoln, with Mr. Simpson, whom he had met at Lady Davy's, and to\nFarnley for a visit to Mr. F.H. Fawkes, the owner of the celebrated\ncollection of Turners (April, 1851).\n\nIn London he was acquainted with many of the leading artists and persons\ninterested in art. Of the \"teachers\" of the day he was known to men so\ndiverse as Carlyle--and Maurice, with whom he corresponded in 1815 about\nhis \"Notes on Sheepfolds\"--and C.H. Spurgeon, to whom his mother was\ndevoted. He was as yet neither a hermit, nor a heretic: but mixed freely\nwith all sorts and conditions, with one exception, for Puseyites and\nRomanists were yet as heathen men and publicans to him; and he noted\nwith interest, while writing his review of Venetian history, that the\nstrength of Venice was distinctly Anti-Papal, and her virtues Christian\nbut not Roman. Reflections on this subject were to have formed part of\nhis great work, but the first volume was taken up with the _\u00e0 priori_\ndevelopment of architectural forms; and the treatment in especial of\nVenetian matters had to be indefinitely postponed, until another visit\nhad given him the opportunity of gathering his material.\n\nMeanwhile, his wide sympathy had turned his mind toward a subject which\nthen had received little attention, though since then loudly\ndiscussed--the reunion of (Protestant) Christians.\n\nHe put together his thoughts in a pamphlet on the text \"There shall be\none fold and one Shepherd,\" calling it, in allusion to his architectural\nstudies, \"Notes on the Construction of Sheepfolds.\" He proposed a\ncompromise, trying to prove that the pretensions to priesthood on the\nhigh Anglican side, and the objections to episcopacy on the\nPresbyterian, were alike untenable; and hoped that, when once these\ndifferences--such little things he thought them--were arranged, a united\nChurch of England might become the nucleus of a world-wide federation of\nProtestants, a _civitas Dei_, a New Jerusalem.\n\nThere were many who agreed with his aspirations: he received shoals of\nletters from sympathizing readers, most of them praising his aims and\ncriticising his means. Others objected rather to his manner than to his\nmatter; the title savoured of levity, and an art-critic writing on\ntheology was supposed to be wandering out of his province. Tradition\nsays that the \"Notes\" were freely bought by Border farmers under a\nrather laughable mistake; but surely it was no new thing for a Scotch\nreader to find a religious tract under a catching title. There were a\nfew replies; one by Mr. Dyce, who defended the Anglican view with mild\npersiflage and the usual commonplaces. And there the matter ended, for\nthe public. For Ruskin, it was the beginning of a train of thought\nwhich led him far. He gradually learnt that his error was not in asking\ntoo much, but in asking too little. He wished for a union of\nProtestants, forgetting the sheep that are not of _that_ fold, and\nlittle dreaming of the answer he got, after many days, in \"Christ's Folk\nin the Apennine.\"\n\nMeanwhile the first volume of \"Stones of Venice\" had appeared, March,\n1851. Its reception was indirectly described in a pamphlet entitled\n\"Something on Ruskinism, with a 'Vestibule' in Rhyme, by an Architect\"\ncomplaining bitterly of the \"ecstasies of rapture\" into which the\nnewspapers had been thrown by the new work:\n\n    \"Your book--since reviewers so swear--may be rational,\n    Still, 'tis certainly not either loyal or national;\"\n\nfor it did not join in the chorus of congratulation to Prince Albert and\nthe British public on the Great Exhibition of 1851, the apotheosis of\ntrade and machinery. The \"Architect\" finds also--what may surprise the\nmodern reader who has not noticed that many an able work has been\nthought unreadable on its first appearance--that he cannot understand\nthe language and ideas:\n\n    \"Your style is so soaring--and some it makes sore--\n    That plain folks can't make out your strange mystical lore.\"\n\nHe will allow the author to be quite right, when he finds something to\nagree upon; but the moment a sore point is touched, then Ruskin is\n\"insane.\" In one respect the \"Architect\" hit the nail on the head:\n\"Readers who are not reviewers by profession can hardly fail to perceive\nthat Ruskinism is violently inimical to _sundry existing interests_.\"\n\nThe best men, we said, were the first to recognise Ruskin's genius. Let\nus throw into the opposite scale an opinion of more weight than the\n\"Architect's,\" in a transcript of the original letter from Carlyle.\n\n\n     \"CHELSEA, _March_ 9, 1851.\n\n     \"DEAR RUSKIN,\n\n     \"I did not know yesterday till your servant was gone that there was\n     any note in the parcel; nor at all what a feat you had done! A loan\n     of the gallant young man's Memoirs was what I expected; and here,\n     in the most chivalrous style, comes a gift of them. This, I think,\n     must be in the style _prior_ to the Renaissance! What can I do but\n     accept your kindness with pleasure and gratitude, though it is far\n     beyond my deserts? Perhaps the next man I meet will use me as much\n     below them; and so bring matters straight again! Truly I am much\n     obliged, and return you many hearty thanks.\n\n     \"I was already deep in the 'Stones'; and clearly purpose to hold on\n     there. A strange, unexpected, and I believe, most true and\n     excellent _Sermon_ in Stones--as well as the best piece of\n     schoolmastering in Architectonics; from which I hope to learn much\n     in a great many ways. The spirit and purport of these critical\n     studies of yours are a singular sign of the times to me, and a very\n     gratifying one. Right good speed to you, and victorious arrival on\n     the farther shore! It is a quite new 'Renaissance,' I believe, we\n     are getting into just now: either towards new, _wider_ manhood,\n     high again as the eternal stars; or else into final death, and the\n     (marsh?) of Gehenna for evermore! A dreadful process, but a needful\n     and inevitable one; nor do I doubt at all which way the issue will\n     be, though which of the extant nations are to get included in it,\n     and which is to be trampled out and abolished in the process, may\n     be very doubtful. God is great: and sure enough, the changes in the\n     'Construction of Sheepfolds' as well as in other things, will\n     require to be very considerable.\n\n     \"We are still labouring under the foul kind of influenza here, I\n     not far from emancipated, my poor wife still deep in the business,\n     though I hope past the deepest. Am I to understand that you too are\n     seized? In a day or two I hope to ascertain that you are well\n     again. Adieu; here is an interruption, here also is the end of the\n     paper.\n\n     \"With many thanks and regards.\"\n\n     [Signature cut away.]\n\nAs soon as the first volume of \"Stones of Venice\" and the \"Notes on the\nConstruction of Sheepfolds\" were published, Ruskin took a short Easter\nholiday at Matlock, and set to work at a new edition of \"Modern\nPainters.\" This was the fifth reprint of the first volume, and the third\nof vol. ii. They were carefully and conscientiously revised, and the\nPostscript indulged in a little triumph at the changed tone of public\ncriticism upon Turner.\n\nBut it was too late to have been much service to the great artist\nhimself. In 1845--after saying good-bye and \"Why _will_ you go to\nSwitzerland? there will be such a _fidge_ about you when you're\ngone\"--Turner lost his health, and was never himself again. The last\ndrawings he did for Ruskin (January, 1848), the \"Br\u00fcnig\" and the\n\"Descent from the St. Gothard to Airolo,\" showed his condition\nunmistakably; and the lonely restlessness of the last, disappointing\nyears were, for all his friends, a melancholy ending to a brilliant\ncareer. Ruskin wrote:\n\n\n     \"This year (1851) he has no picture on the walls of the Academy;\n     and the _Times_ of May 3 says: 'We miss those works of\n     INSPIRATION'!\"\n\n     \"_We_ miss! Who misses? The populace of England\n     rolls by to weary itself in the great bazaar of Kensington,[3]\n     little thinking that a day will come when those veiled vestals and\n     prancing amazons, and goodly merchandise of precious stones and\n     gold, will all be forgotten as though they had not been; but that\n     the light which has faded from the walls of the Academy is one\n     which a million Koh-i-noors could not rekindle; and that the year\n     1851 will, in the far future, be remembered less for what it has\n     displayed, than for what it has withdrawn.\"\n\n[Footnote 3: The Great Exhibition in Hyde Park.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nPRE-RAPHAELITISM (1851-1853)\n\n\nThe _Times_, in May 1851, missed \"those works of inspiration,\" as Ruskin\nhad at last taught people to call Turner's pictures. But the\nacknowledged mouthpiece of public opinion found consolation in\ncastigating a school of young artists who had \"unfortunately become\nnotorious by addicting themselves to an antiquated style and an affected\nsimplicity in painting.... We can extend no toleration to a mere servile\nimitation of the cramped style, false perspective, and crude colour of\nremote antiquity. We want not to see what Fuseli termed drapery 'snapped\ninstead of folded'; faces bloated into apoplexy, or extenuated into\nskeletons; colour borrowed from the jars in a druggist's shop, and\nexpression forced into caricature.... That morbid infatuation which\nsacrifices truth, beauty, and genuine feeling to mere eccentricity\ndeserves no quarter at the hands of the public.\"\n\nRuskin knew nothing personally of these young innovators, and had not at\nfirst sight wholly approved of the apparently Puseyite tendency of\nRossetti's \"Ecce Ancilla Domini,\" Millais' \"Carpenter's Shop,\" and\nHolman Hunt's \"Early Christian Missionary,\" exhibited the year before.\nAll these months he had been closely kept to his \"Sheepfolds\" and\n\"Stones of Venice\"; but now he was correcting the proofs of \"Modern\nPainters,\" vol. i., as thus:\n\n\n     \"Chapter the last, section 21: _The duty and after privileges of\n     all students_.... Go to Nature in all singleness of heart, and walk\n     with her laboriously and trustingly, having no other thoughts but\n     how best to penetrate her meaning, and remember her instruction;\n     rejecting nothing, selecting nothing, and scorning nothing;\n     believing all things to be right and good, and rejoicing always in\n     the truth.\"\n\nAnd at Coventry Patmore's request he went to the Academy to look at the\npictures in question. Yes; the faces were ugly: Millais' \"Mariana\" was a\npiece of idolatrous Papistry, and there was a mistake in the\nperspective. Collins' \"Convent Thoughts\"--more Popery; but very\ncareful--\"the tadpole too small for its age\"; but what studies of\nplants! And there was his own \"Alisma Plantago,\" which he had been\ndrawing for \"Stones of Venice\" (vol. i., plate 7) and describing: \"The\nlines through its body, which are of peculiar beauty, mark the different\nexpansions of its fibres, and are, I think, exactly the same as those\nwhich would be traced by the currents of a river entering a lake of the\nshape of the leaf, at the end where the stalk is, and passing out at its\npoint.\" Curvature was one of the special subjects of Ruskin, the one he\nfound most neglected by ordinary artists. The \"Alisma\" was a test of\nobservation and draughtsmanship. He had never seen it so thoroughly or\nso well drawn, and heartily wished the study were his.\n\nLooking again at the other works of the school, he found that the one\nmistake in the \"Mariana\" was the only error in perspective in the whole\nseries of pictures; which could not be said of any twelve works,\ncontaining architecture, by popular artists in the exhibition; and that,\nas studies both of drapery and of every other minor detail, there had\nbeen nothing in art so earnest or so complete as these pictures since\nthe days of Albert D\u00fcrer.\n\nHe went home, and wrote his verdict in a letter to _The Times_ (May 9,\n1851). Next day he asked the price of Hunt's \"Two Gentlemen of Verona,\"\nand Millais' \"Return of the Dove.\" On the 13th his letter appeared in\n_The Times_, and on the 26th he wrote again, pointing out beauties, and\nindications of power in conception, and observation of Nature, and\nhandling, where at first he, like the rest of the public, had been\nrepelled by the wilful ugliness of the faces. Meanwhile the\nPre-Raphaelites wrote to tell him that they were neither Papists nor\nPuseyites. The day after his second letter was published he received an\nill-spelt missive, anonymously abusing them. This was the sort of thing\nto interest his love of poetical justice. He made the acquaintance of\nseveral of the Brethren. \"Charley\" Collins, as his friends\naffectionately called him, was the son of a respected R.A., and the\nbrother of Wilkie Collins; himself afterwards the author of a delightful\nbook of travel in France, \"A Cruise upon Wheels.\" Millais turned out to\nbe the most gifted, charming and handsome of young artists. Holman Hunt\nwas already a Ruskin-reader, and a seeker after truth, serious and\nearnest in his religious nature as in his painting.\n\nThe Pre-Raphaelites were not, originally, Ruskin's pupils, nor was their\nmovement, directly, of his creation. But it was the outcome of a general\ntendency which he, more than any man, had helped to set in motion; and\nit was the fulfilment, though in a way he had not expected, of his\nwishes.\n\nHis attraction to Pre-Raphaelitism was none the less real because it was\nsudden, and brought about partly by personal influence. And in\nre-arranging his art-theory to take them in, he had before his mind\nrather what he hoped they would become than what they were. For a time,\nhis influence over them was great; their first three years were their\nown; their next three years were practically his; and some of them, the\nweaker brethren, leaned upon him until they lost the command of their\nown powers. No artist can afford to use another man's eyes; still less,\nanother man's brain and heart. Ruskin, great as an exponent, was in no\nsense a master of artists; and if he cheered on the men, who, he\nbelieved, were the best of the time, it did not follow that he should be\nsaddled with the responsibility of directing them.\n\nThe famous pamphlet on \"Pre-Raphaelitism\" of August, 1851, showed that\nthe same motives of Sincerity impelled both the Pre-Raphaelite Brethren\nand Turner and, in a degree, men so different as Prout, old Hunt, and\nLewis. All these were opposed to the Academical School who worked by\nrule of thumb; and they differed among one another only in differences\nof physical power and moral aim. Which was all perfectly true, and much\ntruer than the cheap criticism which could not see beyond superficial\ndifferences, or the fossil theories of the old school. But\nPre-Raphaelitism was an unstable compound, liable to explode upon the\nexperimenter, and its component parts to return to their old antithesis\nof crude naturalism on the one hand, and affectation of piety or poetry\nor antiquarianism, on the other. And _that_ their new champion did not\nthen foresee. All he knew was that, just when he was sadly leaving the\nscene, Turner gone and night coming on, new lights arose. It was really\nfar more noteworthy that Millais and Rossetti and Hunt were _men of\ngenius_, than that the \"principles\" they tried to illustrate were sound,\nand that Ruskin divined their power, and generously applauded them.\n\nImmediately after finishing the pamphlet on \"Pre-Raphaelitism,\" he left\nfor the Continent with his wife and friends, the Rev. and Mrs. Daniel\nMoore; spent a fortnight in his beloved Savoy, with the Pritchards; and\nthen crossed the Alps with Charles Newton. On the 1st of September he\nwas at Venice, for a final spell of labour on the palaces and churches.\nAfter spending a week with Rawdon Brown he settled at Casa Wetzler,\nCampo Sta. Maria Zobenigo, and during the autumn and winter not only\nworked extremely hard at his architecture, but went with his wife into\nAustrian and Italian society and saw many distinguished visitors. One of\nthem, whom he lectured on the shortcomings of the Renaissance, was Dean\nMilman. \"I am amused at your mode of ciceronizing the Dean of St.\nPaul's,\" wrote his father, who kept up the usual close correspondence,\nand made himself useful in looking up books of reference and consulting\nauthorities like Mr. James Fergusson--for these chapters of easy\neloquence were not written without a world of pains. The engravers and\nthe business department of the new publications also required his\nco-operation, for they were now becoming large ventures. During the\nthree and a half years preceding the summer of 1851 Ruskin seems to have\nspent \u00a31,680 of profits from his books, making by his writings at this\nperiod only about a third of his annual outlay; so that the estimated\ncost of these great illustrated volumes, some \u00a31,200, was a matter of\nanxiety to his father, who, together with the publisher, deprecated\nlarge plates and technical details, and expressed some impatience to\nsee results from this visit to Venice. He looked eagerly for every new\nchapter or drawing as it was sent home for criticism. Some passages,\nsuch as the description of the Calle San Moise (\"Stones of Venice,\" II.\niv,) were unfavourably received by him. Another time he says, \"You have\na very great difficulty now in writing any more, which is to write up to\nyourself\": or again,--\"Smith reports slow sale of 'Stones of Venice'\n(vol. I.) and 'Pre-Raphaelitism.' The times are sorely against you. The\nExhibition has impoverished the country, and literature of a saleable\ncharacter seems chiefly confined to shilling books in green paper, to be\nhad at railway stations. Smith will have an account against us.\" He\nalways sent adverse press-notices, on the principle that it was good for\nJohn: and every little discouragement or annoyance was discussed in\nfull.\n\nThe most serious news, threatening complete interruption of the work\nrapidly progressing in spite of all, was of Turner's death (December 19,\n1851). Old Mr. Ruskin heard of it on the 21st, a \"dismal day\" to him,\nspent in sad contemplation of the pictures his son had taught him to\nlove. Soon it came out that John Ruskin was one of the executors named\nin the will, with a legacy of _\u00a320_ for a mourning ring:--\"Nobody can\nsay you were paid to praise,\" says his father. It was gossipped that he\nwas expected to write Turner's biography--\"five years' work for you,\"\nsays the old man, full of plans for gathering material. But when one\nscandal after another reached his ears, he changed his tone, and\nsuggested dropping personal details, and giving a \"Life of his Art,\" in\nthe intended third and final volume of \"Modern Painters.\" Something of\nthe sort was done in the Edinburgh Lectures and at the close of vol. v.\nof \"Modern Painters\": and the official life was left to Walter\nThornbury, with which Mr. Ruskin perhaps did not wish to interfere. But\nhe collected a mass of then unpublished material about Turner, which\ngoes far to prove that the kindly view he took of the strange man's\nmorbid and unhappy life was not without justification. At the time, so\nmany legal complications developed that Ruskin was advised to resign his\nexecutorship; later on he was able to fulfil its duties as he conceived\nthem, in arranging Turner's sketches for the National Gallery.\n\nOthers of his old artist-friends were now passing away. Early in January\nMr. J.J. Ruskin called on William Hunt and found him feeble: \"I like the\nlittle Elshie,\" he says, nicknaming him after the Black Dwarf, for Hunt\nwas somewhat deformed:\n\n\n     \"He is softened and humanized. There is a gentleness and a greater\n     _bonhomie_--less reserve. I had sent him 'Pre-Raphaelitism.' He had\n     marked it very much with pencil. He greatly likes your notice of\n     people not keeping to their last. So many clever artists, he says,\n     have been ruined by not acting on your principles. I got a piece of\n     advice from Hunt,--never to commission a picture. He could not have\n     done my pigeon so well had he felt he was doing it for anybody.\"\n\nThe pigeon was a drawing he had just bought; in later years at\nBrantwood.\n\nIn February 1852 a dinner-party was given to celebrate in his absence\nJohn Ruskin's thirty-third birthday.\n\n\n     \"On Monday, 9th, we had Oldfield (Newton was in Wales), Harrison,\n     George Richmond, Tom, Dr. Grant, and Samuel Prout. The latter I\n     never saw in such spirits, and he went away much satisfied.\n     Yesterday at church we were told that he came home very happy,\n     ascended to his painting-room, and in a quarter of an hour from his\n     leaving our cheerful house was a corpse, from apoplexy. He never\n     spoke after the fit came on. He had always wished for a sudden\n     death.\"\n\nNext year, in November, 1853, he tells of a visit paid, by John's\nrequest, to W.H. Deverell, the young Pre-Raphaelite, whom he found \"in\nsqualor and sickness--with his Bible open--and not long to live--while\nHoward abuses his picture at Liverpool.\"\n\nEarly in 1852 Charles Newton was going to Greece on a voyage of\ndiscovery, and wanted John Ruskin to go with him. But the parents would\nnot hear of his adventuring himself at sea \"in those engine-vessels.\" So\nNewton went alone, and \"dug up loads of Phoenician antiquities.\" One\ncannot help regretting that Ruskin lost this opportunity of\nfamiliarizing himself with the early Greek art which, twenty years later\nhe tried to expound. For the time he was well enough employed on the\n\"Stones of Venice.\" He tells the story of this ten months' stay in a\nletter to his venerable friend Rogers the poet, dated June 23 (1852).\n\n\n     \"I was out of health and out of heart when I first got here. There\n     came much painful news from home, and then such a determined course\n     of bad weather, and every other kind of annoyance, that I never was\n     in a temper fit to write to anyone: the worst of it was that I lost\n     all _feeling_ of Venice, and this was the reason both of my not\n     writing to you and of my thinking of you so often. For whenever I\n     found myself getting utterly hard and indifferent I used to read\n     over a little bit of the 'Venice' in the 'Italy' and it put me\n     always into the right tone of thought again, and for this I cannot\n     be enough grateful to you. For though I believe that in the summer,\n     when Venice is indeed lovely, when pomegranate blossoms hang over\n     every garden-wall, and green sunlight shoots through every wave,\n     custom will not destroy, or even weaken, the impression conveyed at\n     first; it is far otherwise in the length and bitterness of the\n     Venetian winters. Fighting with frosty winds at every turn of the\n     canals takes away all the old feelings of peace and stillness; the\n     protracted cold makes the dash of the water on the walls a sound of\n     simple discomfort, and some wild and dark day in February one\n     starts to find oneself actually balancing in one's mind the\n     relative advantages of land and water carriage, comparing the Canal\n     with Piccadilly, and even hesitating whether for the rest of one's\n     life one would rather have a gondola within call or a hansom.\"\n\nHe then goes on to lament the decay of Venice, the idleness and\ndissipation of the populace, the lottery gambling; and to forebode the\n\"destruction of old buildings and erection of new\" changing the place\n\"into a modern town--a bad imitation of Paris.\" Better than that he\nthinks would be utter neglect; St. Mark's Place would again be, what it\nwas in the early ages, a green field, and the front of the Ducal Palace\nand the marble shafts of St. Mark's would be rooted in wild violets and\nwreathed with vines:\n\n\n     \"She will be beautiful again then, and I could almost wish that the\n     time might come quickly, were it not that so many noble pictures\n     must be destroyed first.... I love Venetian pictures more and more,\n     and wonder at them every day with greater wonder; compared with all\n     other paintings they are so easy, so instinctive, so natural;\n     everything that the men of other schools did by rule and called\n     composition, done here by instinct and only called truth.\n\n     \"I don't know when I have envied anybody more than I did the other\n     day the directors and clerks of the Zecca. There they sit at inky\n     deal desks, counting out rolls of money, and curiously weighing the\n     irregular and battered coinage of which Venice boasts; and just\n     over their heads, occupying the place which in a London\n     countinghouse would be occupied by a commercial almanack, a\n     glorious Bonifazio--'Solomon and the Queen of Sheba'; and in a less\n     honourable corner three _old_ directors of the Zecca, very\n     mercantile-looking men indeed, counting money also, like the living\n     ones, only a little _more_ living, painted by Tintoret; not to\n     speak of the scattered Palma Vecchios, and a lovely Benedetto Diana\n     which no one ever looks at. I wonder when the European mind will\n     again awake to the great fact that a noble picture was not painted\n     to be _hung_, but to be _seen_? I only saw these by accident,\n     having been detained in Venice by soma obliging person who\n     abstracted some [of his wife's jewels] and brought me thereby into\n     various relations with the respectable body of people who live at\n     the wrong end of the Bridge of Sighs--the police, whom, in spite of\n     traditions of terror, I would very willingly have changed for some\n     of those their predecessors whom you have honoured by a note in the\n     'Italy.' The present police appear to act on exactly contrary\n     principles; yours found the purse and banished the loser; these\n     _don't_ find the jewels, and won't let me go away. I am afraid no\n     punishment is appointed in Venetian law for people who steal\n     _time_.\"\n\nMr. Ruskin returned to England in July, 1852, and settled next door to\nhis old home on Herne Hill. He said he could not live any more in Park\nStreet, with a dead brick wall opposite his windows. And so, under the\nroof where he wrote the first volume of \"Modern Painters,\" he finished\n\"Stones of Venice.\" These latter volumes give an account of St. Mark's\nand the Ducal Palace and other ancient buildings; a complete catalogue\nof Tintoret's pictures--the list he had begun in 1845; and a history of\nthe successive styles of architecture, Byzantine, Gothic, and\nRenaissance, interweaving illustrations of the human life and character\nthat made the art what it was.\n\nThe kernel of the work was the chapter on the Nature of Gothic; in which\nhe showed, more distinctly than in the \"Seven Lamps,\" and connected with\na wider range of thought, suggested by Pre-Raphaelitism, the doctrine\nthat art cannot be produced except by artists; that architecture, in so\nfar as it is an art, does not mean mechanical execution, by\nunintelligent workmen, from the vapid working-drawings of an architect's\noffice; and, just as Socrates postponed the day of justice until\nphilosophers should be kings and kings philosophers, so Ruskin postponed\nthe reign of art until workmen should be artists, and artists workmen.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE EDINBURGH LECTURES (1853-1854)\n\n\nBy the end of June, 1853, \"Stones of Venice\" was finished, as well as a\ndescription of Giotto's works at Padua, written for the Arundel Society.\nThe social duties of the season were over; Ruskin and his wife went\nnorth to spend a well-earned holiday. At Wallington in Northumberland,\nstaying with Sir Walter and Lady Trevelyan, he met Dr. John Brown at\nEdinburgh, author of \"Pet Marjorie\" and other well-known works, who\nbecame his lifelong friend. Ruskin invited Millais, by this time an\nintimate and heartily-admired friend,[4] to join them at Glenfinlas.\nRuskin devoted himself first to foreground studies, and made careful\ndrawings of rock-detail; and then, being asked to give a course of\nlectures before the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh, he was soon busy\nwriting once more, and preparing the cartoon-sketches, \"diagrams\" as he\ncalled them, to illustrate his subjects. Dr. Acland had joined the\nparty; and he asked Millais to sketch their host as he stood\ncontemplatively on the rocks with the torrent thundering beside him. The\npicture with additional work in the following winter, became the\nwell-known portrait in the possession of Sir Henry Acland, much the best\nlikeness of this early period.\n\n[Footnote 4: \"What a beauty of a man he is!\" wrote old Mr. Ruskin, \"and\nhigh in intellect.... Millais' sketches are 'prodigious'! Millais is the\npainter of the age.\" \"Capable, it seems to me, of almost everything, if\nhis life and strength be spared,\" said the younger Ruskin to Miss\nMitford.]\n\nAnother portrait was painted--in words--by one of his audience at\nEdinburgh on November 1, when he gave the opening lecture of his course,\nhis first appearance on the platform. The account is extracted from the\n_Edinburgh Guardian_ of November 19, 1853:\n\n\n     \"Before you can see the lecturer, however, you must get into the\n     hall, and that is not an easy matter, for, long before the doors\n     are opened, the fortunate holders of season tickets begin to\n     assemble, so that the crowd not only fills the passage, but\n     occupies the pavement in front of the entrance and overflows into\n     the road. At length the doors open, and you are carried through the\n     passage into the hall, where you take up, of course, the best\n     available position for seeing and hearing.... After waiting a weary\n     time ... the door by the side of the platform opens, and a thin\n     gentleman with light hair, a stiff white cravat, dark overcoat with\n     velvet collar, walking, too with a slight stoop, goes up to the\n     desk, and looking round with a self-possessed and somewhat formal\n     air, proceeds to take off his great-coat, revealing thereby, in\n     addition to the orthodox white cravat, the most orthodox of white\n     waistcoats.... 'Dark hair, pale face, and massive marble brow--that\n     is my ideal of Mr. Ruskin,' said a young lady near us. This proved\n     to be quite a fancy portrait, as unlike the reality as could well\n     be imagined, Mr. Ruskin has light sand-coloured hair; his face is\n     more red than pale; the mouth well-cut, with a good deal of\n     decision in its curve, though somewhat wanting in sustained dignity\n     and strength; an aquiline nose; his forehead by no means broad or\n     massive, but the brows full and well bound together; the eye we\n     could not see, in consequence of the shadows that fell upon his\n     countenance from the lights overhead, but we are sure it must be\n     soft and luminous, and that the poetry and passion we looked for\n     almost in vain in other features must be concentrated there.[5]\n     After sitting for a moment or two, and glancing round at the sheets\n     on the wall as he takes off his gloves, he rises, and leaning\n     slightly over the desk, with his hands folded across, begins at\n     once,--'You are proud of your good city of Edinburgh,' etc.\n\n     [Footnote 5: \"Mary Russell Mitford found him as a young man 'very\n     eloquent and distinguished-looking, tall, fair, and slender, with a\n     gentle playfulness, and a sort of pretty waywardness that was quite\n     charming.' Sydney Dobell, again, in 1852, discovered an earnestness\n     pervading every feature, giving power to a face that otherwise\n     would be merely lovable for its gentleness. And, finally, one who\n     visited him at Denmark Hill characterized him as emotional and\n     nervous, with a soft, genial eye, a mouth 'thin and severe,' and a\n     voice that, though rich and sweet, yet had a tendency to sink into\n     a plaintive and hopeless tone,\"--_Literary World_, May 19, 1893.]\n\n     \"And now for the style of the lecture.... Properly speaking, there\n     were two styles essentially distinct, and not well blended,--a\n     speaking and a writing style; the former colloquial and spoken\n     off-hand; the latter rhetorical and carefully read in quite a\n     different voice,--we had almost said intoned.... He has a\n     difficulty in sounding the letter 'r'; [and there is a] peculiar\n     tone in the rising and falling of his voice at measured intervals,\n     in a way scarcely ever heard except in the public lection of the\n     service appointed to be read in churches. These are the two things\n     with which, perhaps you are most surprised,--his dress and manner\n     of speaking--both of which (the white waistcoat notwithstanding)\n     are eminently clerical. You naturally expect, in one so\n     independent, a manner free from conventional restraint, and an\n     utterance, whatever may be the power of voice, at least expressive\n     of a strong individuality; and you find instead a Christ Church man\n     of ten years' standing, who has not yet taken orders; his dress and\n     manner derived from his college tutor, and his elocution from the\n     chapel-reader.\"\n\nThe lectures were a summing up, in popular form, of the chief topics of\nRuskin's thought during the last two years. The first (November 1)\nstated, with more decision and warmth than part of his audience\napproved, his plea for the Gothic Revival, for the use of Gothic as a\ndomestic style. The next lecture, given three days later, went on to\ncontrast the wealth of ornament in medi\u00e6val buildings with the poor\nsurvivals of conventionalized patterns which did duty for decoration in\nnineteenth-century \"Greek\" architecture; and he raised a laugh by\ncomparing a typical stonemason's lion with a real tiger's head, drawn in\nthe Edinburgh zoological gardens by Mr. Millais.\n\nThe last two lectures, on November 15 and 18, were on Painting; briefly\nreviewing the history of landscape and the life and aims of Turner; and\nfinally, Christian art and Sincerity in imagination, which was now put\nforth as the guiding principle of Pre-Raphaelitism.\n\nPublic opinion was violently divided over these lectures; and they were\nthe cause of much trouble at home. The fact of his lecturing at all\naroused strong opposition from his friends and remonstrances from his\nparents. Before the event his mother wrote: \"I cannot reconcile myself\nto the thought of your bringing yourself personally before the world\ntill you are somewhat older and stronger.\" Afterwards, his father, while\napologizing for the word \"degrading,\" is disgusted at his exposing\nhimself to such an interruption as occurred, and to newspaper comments\nand personal references. The notion of an \"itinerant lecturer\"\nscandalizes him. He hears from Harrison and Holding that John is to\nlecture even at their very doors--in Camberwell. \"I see small bills up,\"\nhe writes, \"with the lecturers' names; among them Mr. ---- who gets your\nold clothes!\" And he bids him write to the committee that his parents\nobject to his fulfilling the engagement. He postponed his lecture--for\nten years; but accepted the Presidency of the Camberwell Institute,\nwhich enabled him to appear at their meetings without offence to any.\n\nWhile staying at Edinburgh, Mr. Ruskin met the various celebrities of\nmodern Athens, some of them at the table of his former fellow-traveller\nin Venice, Mrs. Jameson. He then returned home to prepare the lectures\nfor printing.\n\nThese lectures as published in April, 1854 were fiercely assailed by the\nold school; but a more serious blow fell on him before that month was\nout. His wife returned to her parents and instituted a suit against him,\nto which he made no answer. The marriage was annulled in July. A year\nlater she married Millais.\n\nIn May (1854) the Pre-Raphaelites again needed his defence. Mr. Holman\nHunt exhibited the \"Light of the World\" and the \"Awakening Conscience.\"\nRuskin made them the theme of two more letters to _The Times_;\nmentioning, by the way, the \"spurious imitations of Pre-Raphaelite work\"\nwhich were already becoming common. Starting for his summer tour on the\nContinent, in the Simmenthal he wrote a pamphlet on the opening of the\nCrystal Palace. There had been much rejoicing over the \"new style of\narchitecture\" in glass and iron, and its purpose as a palace of art.\nRuskin who had declined, in the last chapter of the \"Seven Lamps,\" to\njoin in the cry for a new style, was not at all ready to accept this as\nany real artistic advance; and took the opportunity to plead again for\nthe great buildings of the past, which were being destroyed or\nneglected, while the British public was glorifying its gigantic\ngreenhouse. The pamphlet practically suggested the establishment of the\nSociety for the preservation of ancient buildings, which has since come\ninto operation.\n\nThis summer of 1854 he projected a study of Swiss history: to tell the\ntale of six chief towns--Geneva, Fribourg, Basle, Thun, Baden and\nSchaffhausen, to which in 1858 he added Rheinfelden and Bellinzona. He\nintended to illustrate the work with pictures of the places described.\nHe began with his drawing of Thun, a large bird's-eye view of the town\nwith its river and bridges, roofs and towers, all exquisitely defined\nwith the pen, and broadly coloured in fluctuating tints that seem to\nmelt always into the same aerial blue; the blue, high up the picture,\nbeyond the plain, deepening into distant mountains.\n\nBut his father wanted to see \"Modern Painters\" completed, and so he\nbegan his third volume at Vevey, with the discussion of the grand style,\nin which he at last broke loose from Reynolds, as was inevitable, after\nhis study of Pre-Raphaelitism, and all the varied experiences of the\nlast ten years. The lesson of the Tulse Hill ivy had been brought home\nto him in many ways: he had found it to be more and more true that\nNature is, after all, the criterion of art, and that the greatest\npainters were always those whose aim, so far as they were conscious of\nan aim, was to take fact for their starting-point. Idealism, beauty,\nimagination, and the rest, though necessary to art, could not, he felt,\nbe made the object of study; they were the gift of heredity, of\ncircumstances, of national aspirations and virtues; not to be produced\nby the best of rules, or achieved by the best of intentions.\n\nWhat his own view of his own work was can be gathered from a letter to\nan Edinburgh student, written on August 6, 1854:\n\n\n     \"I am sure I never said anything to dissuade you from trying to\n     excel or to do great things. I only wanted you to be sure that your\n     efforts were made with a substantial basis, so that just in the\n     moment of push your footing might not give way beneath you; and\n     also I wanted you to feel that long and steady effort made in a\n     contented way does more than violent effort made from some strong\n     motive and under some enthusiastic impulse. And I repeat--for of\n     this I am perfectly sure--that the best things are only to be done\n     in this way. It is very difficult thoroughly to understand the\n     difference between indolence and reserve of strength, between\n     apathy and severity, between palsy and patience; but there is all\n     the difference in the world; and nearly as many men are ruined by\n     inconsiderate exertions as by idleness itself. To do as much as you\n     can heartily and happily do each day in a well-determined\n     direction, with a view to far-off results, with present enjoyment\n     of one's work, is the only proper, the only essentially profitable\n     way.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nTHE WORKING MEN'S COLLEGE (1854-1855)\n\n\nPhilanthropic instincts, and a growing sense of the necessity for social\nreform, had led Ruskin for some years past towards a group of liberal\nthinkers with whom he had little otherwise in common. At Venice, in\n1852, he had written several articles on education, taxation, and so\nforth, with which he intended to plunge into active politics. His\nfather, like a cautious man of business who knew his son's powers and\nthought he knew their limitations, was strongly opposed to this\nattempt, and used every argument against it. He appealed to his son's\nsensitiveness, and assured him that he would be \"flayed\" unless he\nwrapped himself in the hide of a rhinoceros. He assured him that,\nwithout being on the spot to follow the discussions of politicians, it\nwas useless to offer them any opinions whatsoever. And he ended by\ndeclaring that it would be the ruin of his business and of his peace of\nmind if the name of Ruskin were mixed up with Radical electioneering:\nnot that he was unwilling to suffer martyrdom for a cause in which he\nbelieved, but he did not believe in the movements afoot--neither the\nTailors' Cooperative Society, in which their friend F.J. Furnivall was\ninterested, nor in any outcome of Chartism or Chartist principles. And\nso for a time the matter dropped.\n\nIn 1854, the Rev. F.D. Maurice founded the Working Men's College. Mr.\nFurnivall sent the circulars to John Ruskin; who thereupon wrote to\nMaurice, and offered his services. At the opening lecture on October 31,\n1854, at St. Martin's Hall, Long Acre, Furnivall distributed to all\ncomers a reprint of the chapter \"On the Nature of Gothic,\" which we have\nalready noticed as a statement of the conclusions drawn from the study\nof art respecting the conditions under which the life of the workman\nshould be regulated. Ruskin thus appeared as contributing, so to say,\nthe manifesto of the movement.\n\nHe took charge from the commencement of the drawing-classes--first at 31\nRed Lion Square, and afterwards at Great Ormond Street; also\nsuper-intending classes taught by Messrs. Jeffery and E. Cooke at the\nWorking Women's (afterwards the Working Men and Women's) College, Queen\nSquare.\n\nIn this labour he had two allies; one a friend of Maurice's, Lowes\nDickinson, the well-known artist, whose portrait of Maurice was\nmentioned with honour in the \"Notes on the Academy\"; his portrait of\nKingsley hangs in the hall of the novelist-professor's college at\nCambridge. The other helper was new friend.\n\nTo people who know him only as the elegant theorist of art, sentimental\nand egotistic, as they will have it, there must be something strange,\nalmost irreconcilable, in his devotion, week after week and year after\nyear, to these night-classes. Still more must it astonish them to find\nthe mystic author of the \"Blessed Damozel,\" the passionate painter of\nthe \"Venus Verticordia,\" working by Ruskin's side in this rough\nnavvy-labour of philanthropy.\n\nIt was early in 1854 that a drawing of D.G. Rossetti was sent to Ruskin\nby a friend of the painter's. The critic already knew Millais and Hunt\npersonally, but not Rossetti. He wrote kindly, signing himself \"yours\nrespectfully,\" which amused the young painter. He made acquaintance, and\nin the appendix to his Edinburgh Lectures placed Rossetti's name with\nthose of Millais and Hunt, especially praising their imaginative power,\nas rivalling that of the greatest of the old masters.\n\nHe did more than this. He agreed to buy, up to a certain sum every year,\nany drawings that Rossetti brought him, at their market price; and his\nstandard of money-value for works of art has never been niggardly. This\nsort of help, the encouragement to work, is exactly what makes progress\npossible to a young and independent artist; it is better for him than\nfortuitous exhibition triumphs--much better than the hack-work which\nmany have to undertake, to eke out their livelihood. And the mere fact\nof being bought by the eminent art-critic was enough to encourage other\npatrons.\n\n\"He seems in a mood to make my fortune,\" said Rossetti in the spring of\n1854; and early in 1855 Ruskin wrote:\n\n\n     \"It seems to me that, of all the painters I know, you on the whole\n     have the greatest genius; and you appear to me also to be--as far\n     as I can make out--a very good sort of person, I see that you are\n     unhappy, and that you can't bring out your genius as you should.\n     It seems to me then the proper and _necessary_ thing, if I can, to\n     make you more happy; and that I shall be more really useful in\n     enabling you to paint properly, and keep your room in order, than\n     in any other way.\"\n\nHe did his best to keep that room in order in every sense. Anxious to\npromote the painter's marriage with Miss Siddal--\"Princess Ida,\" as\nRuskin called her--he offered a similar arrangement to that which he had\nmade with Rossetti; and began in 1855 to give her \u00a3150 a year in\nexchange for drawings up to that value. Rossetti's poems also found a\nwarm admirer and advocate. In 1856, \"The Burden of Nineveh\" was\npublished anonymously in the _Oxford and Cambridge Magazine_; Ruskin\nwrote to Rossetti that it was \"glorious\" and that he wanted to know who\nwas the author,--perhaps not without a suspicion that he was addressing\nthe man who could tell. In 1861 he guaranteed, or advanced, the cost of\n\"The Early Italian Poets,\" up to \u00a3100, with Smith and Elder; and\nendeavoured, but unsuccessfully, to induce Thackeray to find a place for\nother poems in _The Cornhill Magazine._\n\nMr. W.M. Rossetti, in his book on his brother \"as Designer and Writer\"\nand in his \"Family Letters,\" draws a pleasant picture of the intimacy\nbetween the artist and the critic. \"At one time,\" he says, \"I am sure\nthey even loved one another.\" But in 1865 Rossetti, never very tolerant\nof criticism and patronage, took in bad part his friend's remonstrances\nabout the details of \"Venus Verticordia.\" Eighteen months later, Ruskin\ntried to renew the old acquaintance. Rossetti did not return his call;\nand further efforts on Ruskin's part, up to 1870, met with little\nresponse. But the lecture on Rossetti in \"The Art of England\" shows that\non one side at least \"their parting,\" as Mr. W.M. Rossetti says, \"was\nnot in anger;\" and the portrait of 1861, now in the Oxford University\nGalleries, will remain as a memorial of the ten years' friendship of the\ntwo famous men.\n\nAt Red Lion Square, during Lent term, 1855, the three teachers worked\ntogether every Thursday evening. With the beginning of the third term,\nMarch 29, the increase of the class made it more convenient to divide\ntheir forces. Rossetti thenceforward taught the figure on another night\nof the week; while the elementary and landscape class continued to meet\non Thursdays under Ruskin and Lowes Dickinson. In 1856 the elementary\nand landscape class was further divided, Mr. Dickinson taking Tuesday\nevenings, and Ruskin continuing the Thursday class, with the help of\nWilliam Ward as under-master. Later on, G. Allen, J. Bunney, and W.\nJeffrey were teachers. Burne-Jones, met in 1856 at Rossetti's studio,\nwas also pressed into the service for a time.\n\nThere were four terms in the Working Men's College year, the only\nvacation, except for the fortnight at Christmas, being from the\nbeginning of August to the end of October. Ruskin did not always attend\nthroughout the summer term, though sometimes his class came down to him\ninto the country to sketch. He kept up the work without other\nintermission until May, 1858, after which the completion of \"Modern\nPainters\" and many lecture-engagements took him away for a time. In the\nspring of 1860 he was back at his old post for a term; but after that he\ndiscontinued regular attendance, and went to the Working Men's College\nonly at intervals, to give addresses or informal lectures to students\nand friends. On such occasions the \"drawing-room\" or first floor of the\nhouse in which the College was held would be always crowded, with an\naudience who heard the lecturer at his best; speaking freely among\nfriends out of a full treasure-house \"things new and old\"--accounts of\nrecent travel, lately-discovered glories of art, and the growing burden\nof the prophecy that in those years was beginning to take more definite\nshape in his mind.\n\nAs a teacher, Ruskin spared no pains to make the work interesting. He\nprovided--Mr. E. Cooke informs me that he was the first to\nprovide--casts from natural leaves and fruit in place of the ordinary\nconventional ornament; and he sent a tree to be fixed in a corner of the\nclass-room for light and shade studies. Mr. W. Ward in the preface to\nthe volume of letters already quoted says that he used to bring his\nminerals and shells, and rare engravings and drawings, to show them.\n\n\"His delightful way of talking about these things afforded us most\nvaluable lessons. To give an example: he one evening took for his\nsubject a cap, and with pen and ink showed us how Rembrandt would have\netched, and Albert D\u00fcrer engraved it. This at once explained to us the\ndifferent ideas and methods of the two masters. On another evening he\nwould take a subject from Turner's 'Liber Studiorum,' and with a large\nsheet of paper and some charcoal, gradually block in the subject,\nexplaining at the same time the value and effect of the lines and\nmasses.\"\n\nAnd for sketching from nature he would take his class out into the\ncountry, and wind up with tea and talk. \"It was a treat to hear and see\nhim with his men,\" writes Dr. Furnivall.\n\nHis object in the work, as he said before the Royal Commission on\nNational Institutions, was _not to make artists_, but to make the\nworkmen better men, to develop their powers and feelings,--to educate\nthem, in short. He always has urged young people intending to study art\nas a profession to enter the Academy Schools, as Turner and the\nPre-Raphaelites did, or to take up whatever other serious course of\npractical discipline was open to them. But he held very strongly that\neverybody could learn drawing, that their eyes could be brightened and\ntheir hands steadied, and that they could be taught to appreciate the\ngreat works of nature and of art, without wanting to make pictures or to\nexhibit and sell them.\n\nIt was with this intention that he wrote the \"Elements of Drawing\" in\n1856, supplemented by the \"Elements of Perspective\" in 1859; the\nillustrations for the book were characteristic sketches by the author,\nbeautifully cut by his pupil, W.H. Hooper, who was one of a band of\nengravers and copyists formed by these classes at the Working Men's\nCollege. In spite of the intention not to make artists by his teaching,\nRuskin could not prevent some of his pupils from taking up art as a\nprofession; and those who did so became, in their way, first-rate men.\nGeorge Allen as a mezzotint engraver, Arthur Burgess as a draughtsman\nand wood-cutter, John Bunney as a painter of architectural detail, W.\nJeffery as an artistic photographer, E. Cooke as a teacher, William Ward\nas a facsimile copyist, have all done work whose value deserves\nacknowledgment, all the more because it was not aimed at popular effect,\nbut at the severe standard of the greater schools. But these men were\nonly the side issue of the Working Men's College enterprise. Its real\nresult was in the proof that the labouring classes could be interested\nin Art; and that the capacity shown by the Gothic workman had not\nentirely died out of the nation, in spite of the interregnum, for a full\ncentury, of manufacture. And the experience led Ruskin forward to wider\nviews on the nature of the arts, and on the duties of philanthropic\neffort and social economy.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\n\"MODERN PAINTERS\" CONTINUED (1855-1856)\n\n\nIt was in the year 1855 that Ruskin first published \"Notes on the Royal\nAcademy and other Exhibitions.\" He had been so often called upon to\nwrite his opinion of Pre-Raphaelite pictures, either privately or to\nthe newspapers, or to mark his friends' catalogues, that he found at\nlast less trouble in printing his notes once for all. The new plan was\nimmediately popular; three editions of the pamphlet were called for\nbetween June 1 and July 1. Next year he repeated the \"Notes\" and six\neditions were sold.\n\nIn spite of a dissentient voice here and there, he was really by that\ntime recognised as the leading authority upon taste in painting. He was\ntrusted by a great section of the public, who had not failed to notice\nhow completely he and his friends were winning the day. The proof of it\nwas in the fact that they were being imitated on all sides; Ruskinism in\nwriting and Pre-Raphaelitism in painting were becoming fashionable.\n\nBut at the same time the movement gave rise to the Naturalist-landscape\nschool, a group of painters who threw overboard the traditions of Turner\nand Prout, Constable and Harding, and the rest, just as the\nPre-Raphaelite Brethren threw over the Academical masters. For such men\ntheir study was their picture; they devised tents and huts in wild glens\nand upon waste moors, and spent weeks in elaborating their details\ndirectly from nature, instead of painting at home from sketches on the\nspot.\n\nThis was the fulfilment of his advice to young artists; and so far as\nyoung artists worked in this way, for purposes of study, he encouraged\nthem. But he did not fail to point out that this was not all that could\nbe required of them. Even such a work as Brett's \"Val d'Aosta,\"\nmarvellous as it was in observation and finish, was only the beginning\nof a new era, not its consummation. It was not the painting of detail\nthat could make a great artist; but the knowledge of it, and the\nmasterly use of such knowledge. A great landscapist would know the facts\nand effects of nature, just as Tintoret knew the form of the human\nfigure; and he would treat them with the same freedom, as the means of\nexpressing great ideas, of affording by the imagination noble grounds\nfor noble emotion, which, as Ruskin had been writing at Vevey in 1854,\nwas poetry. Meanwhile the public and the critic ought to become familiar\nwith the aspects of nature, in order to recognise the difference between\nthe true poetry of painting, and the mere empty sentimentalism which was\nonly the rant and bombast of landscape art.\n\nWith such feelings as these he wrote the third and fourth volumes of\n\"Modern Painters,\" (published respectively January 15 and April 14,\n1856). The work was afterwards interrupted only by a recurrence of his\nold cough, in the exceptionally cold summer of 1855. He went down to\nTunbridge Wells, where his cousin, William Richardson of Perth, was\npractising as a doctor; it was not long before the cough gave way to\ntreatment, and he was as busy as ever. About October of that year he\nwrote to Mrs. Carlyle as follows, in a letter printed by Professor C.E.\nNorton, conveniently summing up his year:\n\n\n     \"Not that I have not been busy--and very busy, too. I have written,\n     since May, good six hundred pages, had them rewritten, cut up,\n     corrected, and got fairly ready for press--and am going to press\n     with the first of them on Gunpowder Plot day, with a great hope of\n     disturbing the Public Peace in various directions. Also, I have\n     prepared above thirty drawings for engravers this year, retouched\n     the engravings (generally the worst part of the business), and\n     etched some on steel myself. In the course of the six hundred pages\n     I have had to make various remarks on German Metaphysics, on\n     Poetry, Political Economy, Cookery, Music, Geology, Dress,\n     Agriculture, Horticulture, and Navigation,[6] all of which subjects\n     I have had to 'read up' accordingly, and this takes time. Moreover,\n     I have had my class of workmen out sketching every week in the\n     fields during the summer; and have been studying Spanish proverbs\n     with my father's partner, who came over from Spain to see the\n     Great Exhibition. I have also designed and drawn a window for the\n     Museum at Oxford; and have every now and then had to look over a\n     parcel of five or six new designs for fronts and backs to the said\n     Museum.\n\n     [Footnote 6: Most of these subjects will be easily recognised in\n     \"Modern Painters,\" Vols. III. and IV. The \"Navigation\" refers to\n     the \"Harbours of England.\"]\n\n     \"During my above-mentioned studies of horticulture, I became\n     dissatisfied with the Linn\u00e6an, Jussieuan, and Everybody-elseian\n     arrangement of plants, and have accordingly arranged a system of my\n     own; and unbound my botanical book, and rebound it in brighter\n     green, with all the pages through-other, and backside foremost--so\n     as to cut off all the old paging numerals; and am now printing my\n     new arrangement in a legible manner, on interleaved foolscap. I\n     consider this arrangement one of my great achievements of the year.\n     My studies of political economy have induced me to think also that\n     nobody knows anything about that; and I am at present engaged in an\n     investigation, on independent principles, of the natures of money,\n     rent, and taxes, in an abstract form, which sometimes keeps me\n     awake all night. My studies of German metaphysics have also induced\n     me to think that the Germans don't know anything about _them_; and\n     to engage in a serious enquiry into the meaning of Bunsen's great\n     sentence in the beginning of the second volume of the 'Hippolytus,'\n     about the Finite realization of Infinity; which has given me some\n     trouble.\n\n     \"The course of my studies of Navigation necessitated my going to\n     Deal to look at the Deal boats; and those of geology to rearrange\n     all my minerals (and wash a good many, which, I am sorry to say, I\n     found wanted it). I have also several pupils, far and near, in the\n     art of illumination; an American young lady to direct in the study\n     of landscape painting, and a Yorkshire young lady to direct in the\n     purchase of Turners,--and various little bye things besides. But I\n     am coming to see you.\"\n\nThe tone of humorous exaggeration of his discoveries and occupations was\nvery characteristic. But he was then growing into the habit of leaving\nthe matter in hand, as he often did afterwards, to follow side issues,\nand to take up new studies with a hasty and divided attention; the\nresult of which was seen in his sub-title for the third volume of\n\"Modern Painters\"--\"Of Many Things\"; which amused his readers not a\nlittle. But that he still had time for his friends is seen in the\naccount of a visit to Denmark Hill, written this year by James Smetham.\n\n\n     \"I walked there through the wintry weather, and got in about dusk.\n     One or two gossiping details will interest you before I give you\n     what I care for; and so I will tell you that he has a large house\n     with a lodge, and a valet and footman and coachman, and grand rooms\n     glittering with pictures, chiefly Turner's, and that his father and\n     mother live with him, or he with them.... His father is a fine old\n     gentleman, who has a lot of bushy gray hair, and eyebrows sticking\n     up all rough and knowing, with a comfortable way of coming up to\n     you with his hands in his pockets, and making _you_ comfortable,\n     and saying, in answer to your remark, that 'John's' prose works are\n     pretty good. His mother is a ruddy, dignified, richly dressed old\n     gentlewoman of seventy-five, who knows Chamonix better than\n     Camberwell; evidently a _good_ old lady, with the 'Christian\n     Treasury'tossing about on the table. She puts 'John' down, and\n     holds her own opinions, and flatly contradicts him; and he receives\n     all her opinions with a soft reverence and gentleness that is\n     pleasant to witness....\n\n     \"I wish I could reproduce a good impression of 'John' for you, to\n     give you the notion of his 'perfect gentleness and lowlihood.' He\n     certainly bursts out with a remark, and in a contradictious way,\n     but only because he believes it, with no air of dogmatism or\n     conceit. He is different at home from that which he is in a lecture\n     before a mixed audience, and there is a spiritual sweetness in the\n     half-timid expression of his eyes; and in bowing to you, as in\n     taking wine, with (if I heard aright) 'I drink to thee,' he had a\n     look that has followed me, a look bordering on tearful.\n\n     \"He spent some time in this way. Unhanging a Turner from the wall\n     of a distant room, he brought it to the table and put it in my\n     hands; then we talked; then he went up into his study to fetch down\n     some illustrative print or drawing; in one case, a literal view\n     which he had travelled fifty miles to make, in order to compare\n     with the picture. And so he kept on gliding all over the house,\n     hanging and unhanging, and stopping a few minutes to talk.\"\n\nAnd yet there were many with whom he had to deal who did not look at\nthings in his light; who took his criticism as personal attack, and\nresented it with bitterness. There is a story told (but not by himself)\nabout one of the \"Notes on the Academy,\" which he was then\npublishing--how he wrote to an artist therein mentioned that he\nregretted he could not speak more favourably of his picture, but he\nhoped it would make no difference in their friendship. The artist\nreplied (so they say) in these terms: \"Dear Ruskin,--Next time I meet\nyou, I shall knock you down; but I hope it will make no difference in\nour friendship.\" \"Damn the fellow! why doesn't he stand up for his\nfriends?\" said another disappointed acquaintance. Perhaps Ruskin, secure\nin his \"house with a lodge, and a valet and footman and coachman,\"\nhardly realized that a cold word from his pen sometimes meant the\nfailure of an important Academy picture, and serious loss of\nincome--that there was bitter truth underlying _Punch's_ complaint of\nthe Academician:\n\n    \"I paints and paints.\n    Hears no complaints,\n     And sells before I'm dry;\n    Till savage Ruskin\n    Sticks his tusk in,\n     And nobody will buy.\"\n\nAgainst these incidents should be set such an anecdote as the following,\ntold by Mr. J.J. Ruskin in a letter of June 3, 1858:\n\n\n     \"Vokins wished me to name to you that Carrick, when he read your\n     criticism on 'Weary Life,' came to him with the cheque Vokins had\n     given, and said your remarks were all right, and that he could not\n     take the price paid by Vokins the buyer; he would alter the\n     picture. Vokins took back the money, only agreeing to see the\n     picture when it was done.\"\n\nJohn Ruskin in reply said he did not see why Carrick should have\nreturned the cheque.\n\nA letter from Mrs. Browning describes a visit to Denmark Hill, and\nends,--\"I like Mr. Ruskin very much, and so does Robert; very gentle,\nyet earnest--refined and truthful. I like him very much. We count him\none among the valuable acquaintances made this year in England.\" This\nhas been dated 1855; but Ruskin, writing to Miss Mitford from\nGlenfinlas, 17th August, 1853, says, \"I had the pleasure this spring, of\nbeing made acquainted with your dear Elizabeth Browning, as well as with\nher husband. I was of course prepared to like _her_, but I did not\nexpect to like _him_ as much as I did. I think he is really a very fine\nfellow, and _she_ is the only sensible woman I have yet met with on the\nsubject of Italian politics. Evidently a noble creature in all things.\"\nIn June, 1850, he had met Robert Browning, on the invitation of Coventry\nPatmore, and said: \"He is the only person whom I have ever heard talk\nration-ally about the Italians, though on the Liberal side.\"\n\nIn these volumes of \"Modern Painters\" he had to discuss the Medi\u00e6val and\nRenaissance spirit in its relation to art, and to illustrate from\nBrowning's poetry, \"unerring in every sentence he writes of the Middle\nAges, always vital and right and profound; so that in the matter of art\nthere is hardly a principle connected with the medi\u00e6val temper that he\nhas not struck upon in those seemingly careless and too rugged lines of\nhis.\" This was written twenty-five years before the Browning Society was\nheard of, and at a time when the style of Browning was an offence to\nmost people. To Ruskin, also, it had been some, thing of a puzzle; and\nhe wrote to the poet, asking him to explain himself; which the poet\naccordingly did.\n\nThat Ruskin was open to conviction and conversion could be shown from\nthe difference in his tone of thought about poetry before and after this\nperiod; that he was the best of friends with the man who took him to\ntask for narrowness, may be seen from the following letter, written on\nthe next Christmas Eve:\n\n\n     \"MY DEAR MR. RUSKIN,\n\n     \"Your note having just arrived, Robert deputes me to write for him\n     while he dresses to go out on an engagement. It is the evening. All\n     the hours are wasted, since the morning, through our not being\n     found at the Rue de Grenelle, but here--and our instinct of\n     self-preservation or self-satisfaction insists on our not losing a\n     moment more by our own fault.\n\n     \"Thank you, thank you for sending us your book, and also for\n     writing my husband's name in it. It will be the same thing as if\n     you had written mine--except for the pleasure, as you say, which is\n     greater so. How good and kind you are!\n\n     \"And not well. That is worst. Surely you would be better if you had\n     the summer in winter we have here. But I was to write only a\n     word--Let it say how affectionately we regard you.\n\n     \"ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING\n\n     \"3, RUE DU COLYS\u00c9E,\n\n     \"_Thursday Evening, 24th\" (December_, 1855).\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\n\"THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF ART\" (1857-1858)\n\n\nThe humble work of the drawing-classes at Great Ormond Street was\nteaching Ruskin even more than he taught his pupils. It was showing him\nhow far his plans were practicable; how they should be modified; how\nthey might be improved; and especially what more, beside\ndrawing-classes, was needed to realize his ideal. He was anxiously\nwilling to co-operate with every movement, to join hands with any kind\nof man, to go anywhere, do anything that might promote the cause he had\nat heart.\n\nAlready at the end of 1854 he had given three lectures, his second\ncourse, at the Architectural Museum, specially addressed to workmen in\nthe decorative trades. His subjects were design and colour, and his\nillustrations were chiefly drawn from medi\u00e6val illumination, which he\nhad long been studying. These were informal, quasi-private affairs,\nwhich nevertheless attracted notice owing to the celebrity of the\nspeaker. It would have been better if his addresses had been carefully\nprepared and authentically published; for a chance word here and there\nraised replies about matters of detail in which his critics thought they\nhad gained a technical advantage, adding weight to his father's desire\nnot to see him \"expose himself\" in this way. There were no more lectures\nuntil the beginning of 1857.\n\nOn January 23rd, 1857, he spoke before the Architectural Association\nupon \"The Influence of Imagination in Architecture,\" repeating and\namplifying what he had said at Edinburgh about the subordinate value of\nproportion, and the importance of sculptured ornament based on natural\nforms. This of course would involve the creation of a class of\nstone-carvers who could be trusted with the execution of such work. Once\ngrant the value of it, and public demand would encourage the supply, and\nthe workmen would raise themselves in the effort.\n\nA louder note was sounded in an address at the St. Martin's School of\nArt, Castle Street, Long Acre (April 3rd, 1857), where, speaking after\nGeorge Cruikshank, his old friend--practically his first master--and an\nenthusiastic philanthropist and temperance advocate, Ruskin gave his\naudience a wider view of art than they had known before: \"the kind of\npainting they most wanted in London was painting cheeks red with\nhealth.\" This was anticipating the standpoint of the Oxford Lectures,\nand showed how the inquiry was beginning to take a much broader aspect.\n\nAnother work in a similar spirit, the North London School of Design,\nhad been prosperously started by a circle of men under Pre-Raphaelite\ninfluence, and led by Thomas Seddon. He had given up historical and\npoetic painting for naturalistic landscape, and had returned from the\nEast with the most valuable studies completed, only to break down and\ndie prematurely. His friends, among them Holman Hunt, were collecting\nmoney to buy from the widow his picture of Jerusalem from the Mount of\nOlives, to present it to the National Gallery as a memorial of him; and\nat a meeting for the purpose, Ruskin spoke warmly of his labours in the\ncause of the working classes.\n\nIn the summer of 1857 the Art Treasures Exhibition was held at\nManchester, and Ruskin was invited to lecture. The theme he chose was\n\"The Political Economy of Art.\" He had been studying political economy\nfor some time back, but, as we saw from his letter to Carlyle, he had\nfound no answer in the ordinary text-books for the questions he tried to\nput. He wanted to know what Bentham and Ricardo and Mill, the great\nauthorities, would advise him as to the best way of employing artists,\nof educating workmen, of elevating public taste, of regulating\npatronage; but these subjects were not in their programme. And so he put\ntogether his own thoughts into two lectures upon Art considered as\nWealth: first, how to get it; next, how to use it.[7]\n\n[Footnote 7: July 10 and 13, 1857. He went to Manchester from Oxford,\nwhere he had been staying with the Liddells, writing enthusiastically of\nthe beauty of their children and the charm of their domestic life.]\n\nThere were very few points in these lectures that were not vigorously\ncontested at the moment, and conceded in the sequel--in some form or\nother. The paternal function of government, the right of the state to\ninterfere in matters beyond its traditional range, its duty with regard\nto education--all this was quite contrary to the prevailing habits of\nthought of the time, especially at Manchester, the headquarters of the\n_laissez faire_ school; but to Ruskin, who, curiously enough, had just\nthen been referring sarcastically to German philosophy, knowing it only\nat second-hand, and unaware of Hegel's political work--to him this\nPlatonic conception of the state was the only possible one, as it is to\nmost people nowadays. In the same way, his practical advice has been\naccepted, perhaps unwittingly, by our times. We do now understand the\ndifference between artistic decoration and machine-made wares; we do now\ntry to preserve ancient monuments, and to use art as a means of\neducation. And we are in a fair way, it seems, of lowering the price of\nmodern pictures, as he bids us, to \"not more than \u00a3500 for an oil\npicture and \u00a3100 for a water-colour.\"\n\nAfter a visit to the Trevelyans at Wallington he went with his parents\nto Scotland; for his mother, now beginning to grow old, wanted to\nrevisit the scenes of her youth. They went to the Highlands and as far\nnorth as the Bay of Cromarty, and then returned by way of the Abbeys of\nthe Lowlands, to look up Turner sites, as he had done in 1845 on the St.\nGothard. From the enjoyment of this holiday he was recalled to London by\na letter from Mr. Wornum saying that he could arrange the Turner\ndrawings at the National Gallery.\n\nHis first letter on the National Gallery, in 1847, has been noticed. He\nhad written again to _The Times_ (December 29th, 1852), pressing the\nsame point--namely, that if the pictures were put under glass no\ncleaning nor restoring would be needed; and that the Gallery ought not\nto be considered as a grand hall, decorated with pictures, but as a\nconvenient museum, with a chronological sequence of the best works of\nall schools,--every picture hung on the line and accompanied by studies\nfor it, if procurable, and engravings from it.\n\nNow--in 1857--question was raised of removing the National Gallery from\nTrafalgar Square. The South Kensington Museum was being formed, and the\nwhole business of arranging the national art treasures was gone into by\na Royal Commission, consisting of Lord Broughton (in the chair), Dean\nMilman, Prof. Faraday, Prof. Cockerell, and George Richmond. Ruskin was\nexamined before them on April 6th, and re-stated the opinions he had\nwritten to _The Times_, adding that he would like to see two National\nGalleries--one of popular interest, containing such works as would catch\nthe public eye and enlist the sympathy of the untaught; and another\ncontaining only the cream of the collections, in pictures, sculpture and\nthe decorative crafts, arranged for purposes of study. This was\nsuggested as an ideal; of course, it would involve more outlay, and less\ndisplay, than any Parliamentary vote would sanction, or party leader\nrisk.\n\nAnother question of importance was the disposal of the pictures and\nsketches which Turner had left to the nation. Ruskin was one of the\nexecutors under the will; but, on finding that, though Turner's\nintention was plain, there were technical informalities which would make\nthe administration anything but easy, he declined to act. It was not\nuntil 1856 that the litigation was concluded, and Turner's pictures and\nsketches were handed to the Trustees of the National Gallery. Ruskin,\nwhose want of legal knowledge had made his services useless before, now\nfelt that he could carry out the spirit of Turner's will by offering to\narrange the sketches; which were in such a state of confusion that only\nsome person with knowledge of the artist's habits of work and subjects\ncould, so to speak, _edit_ them; and the editor would need no ordinary\nskill, patience and judgment, into the bargain.\n\nMeanwhile, for that winter (1856-7) a preliminary exhibition was held of\nTurner's oil-paintings, with a few water-colours, at Marlborough House,\nthen the headquarters of the Department of Science and Art, soon\nafterwards removed to South Kensington. Ruskin wrote a catalogue, with\nanalysis of Turner's periods of development and characteristics; which\nmade the collection intelligible and interesting to curious sight-seers.\nThey showed their appreciation by taking up five editions in rapid\nsuccession.\n\nJust before lecturing at Manchester, he wrote again on the subject to\n_The Times_; and in September his friend R.N. Wornum, Director of the\nNational Gallery in succession to Eastlake and Uwins, wrote--as we\nsaw--that he might arrange the sketches as he pleased. He returned from\nScotland, and set to work on October 7th.\n\nIt was strange employment for a man of his powers; almost as removed\nfrom the Epicurean Olympus of \"cultured ease\" popularly assigned to him,\nas night-school teaching and lecturing to workmen. But, beside that it\nwas the carrying out of Turner's wishes, he always had a certain love\nfor experimenting in manual toil; and this was work in which his extreme\nneatness and deftness of hand was needed, no less than his knowledge and\njudgment. During the winter for full six months, he and his two\nassistants worked, all day and every day, among the masses of precious\nrubbish that had been removed from Queen Anne Street to the National\nGallery.\n\nMr. J.J. Ruskin wrote, on February 19 and 21, 1852:\n\n\n     \"I have just been through Turner's house with Griffith. His labour\n     is more astonishing than his genius. There are \u00a380,000 of oil\n     pictures done and undone--Boxes half as big as your Study Table,\n     filled with Drawings and Sketches. There are Copies of Liber\n     Studiorum to fill all your Drawers and more, and House Walls of\n     proof plates in Reams--they may go at 1/-each....\n\n     \"Nothing since Pompeii so impressed me as the interior of Turner's\n     house; the accumulated dust of 40 years partially cleared off;\n     Daylight for the first time admitted by opening a window on the\n     finest productions of art buried for 40 years. The Drawing Room\n     has, it is reckoned, \u00a325,000 worth of proofs, and sketches, and\n     Drawings, and Prints. It is amusing to hear Dealers saying there\n     can be no Liber Studiorums--when I saw neatly packed and well\n     labelled as many Bundles of Liber Studiorum as would fill your\n     entire Bookcase, and England and Wales proofs in packed and\n     labelled Bundles like Reams of paper, as I told you, piled nearly\n     to Ceiling ...\n\n     \"The house must be dry as a Bone--the parcels were apparently quite\n     uninjured. The very large pictures were spotted, but not much. They\n     stood leaning against another in the large low Rooms. Some\n     _finished_ go to Nation, many unfinished _not_: no frames. Two are\n     given unconditional of Gallery Building--_very fine_: if (and this\n     is a condition) _placed beside Claude._ The style much like the\n     laying on in Windmill Lock in Dealer's hands, which, now it is\n     cleaned, comes out a real Beauty. I believe Turner loved it. The\n     will desires all to be framed and repaired and put into the best\n     showing state; as if he could not release his money to do this till\n     he was dead. The Top of his Gallery is one ruin of Glass and\n     patches of paper, now only just made weather-proof ...\n\n     \"I saw in Turner's Rooms, _Geo. Morlands_ and _Wilsons_ and\n     _Claudes_ and _portraits_ in various stiles _all by Turner._ He\n     copied every man, was every man first, and took up his own style,\n     casting all others away. It seems to me you may keep your money and\n     revel for ever and for nothing among Turner's Works.\"\n\nAmong the quantities so recklessly thrown aside for dust, damp, soot,\nmice and worms to destroy--some 15,000 Ruskin reckoned at first, 19,000\nlater on--there were many fine drawings, which had been used by the\nengravers, and vast numbers of interesting and valuable studies in\ncolour and in pencil. Four hundred of these were extricated from the\nchaos, and with infinite pains cleaned, flattened, mounted, dated and\ndescribed, and placed in sliding frames in cabinets devised by Ruskin,\nor else in swivel frames, to let both sides of the paper be seen. The\nfirst results of the work were shown in an Exhibition at Marlborough\nHouse during the winter, for which he wrote another catalogue. Of the\nwhole collection he began a more complete account, which was too\nelaborate to be finished in that form; but in 1881 he published a\n\"Catalogue of the Drawings and Sketches of J M.W. Turner, R.A., at\npresent exhibited in the National Gallery,\" so that his plan was\npractically fulfilled.\n\nDuring 1858 Ruskin continued to lecture at various places on subjects\nconnected with his Manchester addresses--the relation of art to\nmanufacture, and especially the dependence of all great architectural\ndesign upon sculpture or painting of organic form. The first of the\nseries was given at the opening of the Architectural Museum at South\nKensington, January 13th, 1858, entitled \"The Deteriorative Power of\nConventional Art over Nations;\" in which he showed that naturalism, as\nopposed to meaningless pattern-making, was always a sign of life. For\nexample, the strength of the Greek, Florentine and Venetian art arose\nout of the search for truth, not, as it is often supposed, out of\nstriving after an ideal of beauty; and as soon as nature was superseded\nby recipe, the greatest schools hastened to their fall. From which he\nconcluded that modern design should always be founded on natural form,\nrather than upon the traditional patterns of the east or of the\nmedi\u00e6vals.\n\nOn February 16th he spoke on \"The Work of Iron, in Nature, Art and\nPolicy,\" at Tunbridge Wells; a subject similar to that of his address to\nthe St. Martin's School of the year before, but amplified into a plea\nfor the use of wrought-iron ornament, as in the new Oxford Museum, then\nbuilding, and on April 25th he again addressed St. Martin's School.\n\nThe Oxford Museum was an experiment in the true Gothic revival. The\narchitects, Sir Thomas Deane and Benjamin Woodward, had allowed their\nworkmen to design parts of the detail, such as capitals and spandrils,\nquite in the spirit of Ruskin's teaching, and the work was accordingly\nof deep interest to him. So far back as April, 1856, he had given an\naddress to the men employed at the Museum, whom he met, on Dr. Acland's\ninvitation, at the Workmen's Reading Rooms. He said that his object was\nnot to give some labouring men the chance of becoming masters of other\nlabouring men, and to help the few at the expense of the many, but to\nlead them to those sources of pleasure, and power over their own minds\nand hands, that more educated people possess. He did not sympathize with\nthe socialism that had been creeping into vogue since 1848. He thought\nexisting social arrangements good, and he agreed with his friends, the\nCarlyles, who had found that it was only the incapable who could not get\nwork. But it was the fault of the wealthy and educated that working\npeople were not better trained; it was not the working-men's fault, at\nbottom. The modern architect used his workman as a mere tool; while the\nGothic spirit set him free as an original designer, to gain--not more\nwages and higher social rank, but pleasure and instruction, the true\nhappiness that lies in good work well done.\n\nTo explain the design of the Oxford Museum and to enlist support, he\nwrote two letters to Dr. Acland (May 25th, 1858, and January 20th,\n1859), which formed part of a small book, reporting its aims and\nprogress, illustrated with an engraving of one of the workmen's\ncapitals. Ruskin himself contributed both time and money to the work,\nand his assistance was not unrecognised. In 1858 \"Honorary Studentships\"\n(i.e., fellowships) were created at Christ Church by the Commissioners'\nordinances. At the first election held, December 6th, 1858, there were\nchosen for the compliment Ruskin, Gladstone, Sir G. Cornewall Lewis, Dr.\n(Sir) H.W. Acland, and Sir F.H. Gore Ouseley. At the second, December\n15th, 1858, were elected Henry Hallam, the Earl of Stanhope, the Earl of\nElgin, the Marquis of Dalhousie and Viscount Canning.\n\nParallel with this movement for educating the \"working-class,\" there was\nthe scheme for the improvement of middle-class education, which was then\ngoing on at Oxford--the beginning of University Extension--supported by\nthe Rev. F. Temple (later Archbishop of Canterbury), and Mr. (afterwards\nSir) Thomas Dyke Acland. Ruskin was heartily for them; and in a letter\non the subject, he tried to show how the teaching of Art might be made\nto work in with the scheme. He did not think that in this plan, any more\nthan at the Working Men's College, there need be an attempt to teach\ndrawing with a view to forming artists; but there were three objects\nthey might hold in view: the first, to give every student the advantage\nof the happiness and knowledge which the study of Art conveys; the next,\nto enforce some knowledge of Art amongst those who were likely to become\npatrons or critics; and the last, _to leave no Giotto lost among hill\nshepherds._\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\n\"MODERN PAINTERS\" CONCLUDED (1838-1860)\n\n\nOxford and old friends did not monopolise Ruskin's attention: he was\nsoon seen at Cambridge--on the same platform with Richard Redgrave,\nR.A., the representative of Academicism and officialism--at the opening\nof the School of Art for workmen on October 29th, 1858. His Inaugural\nAddress struck a deeper note, a wider chord, than previous essays; it\nwas the forecast of the last volume of \"Modern Painters,\" and it\nsketched the train of thought into which he had been led during his tour\nabroad, that summer.\n\nThe battles between faith and criticism, between the historical and the\nscientific attitudes, which had been going on in his mind, were taking a\nnew form. At the outset, we saw, naturalism overpowered respect for\ntradition--in the first volume of \"Modern Painters;\" then the historical\ntendency won the day, in the second volume. Since that time, the\ncritical side had been gathering strength, by his alliance with liberal\nmovements and by his gradual detachment from associations that held\nhim to the older order of thought. As in his lonely journey of 1845\nhe first took independent ground upon questions of religion and social\nlife, so in 1858, once more travelling alone, he was led by his\nmeditations,--freed from the restraining presence of his parents--to\nconclusions which he had been all these years evading, yet finding at\nlast inevitable.\n\nHe went abroad for a third attempt to write and illustrate his History\nof Swiss Towns. He spent part of May on the Upper Rhine between Basle\nand Schaffhausen, June and half of July on the St. Gothard route and at\nBellinzona. In reflecting over the sources of Swiss character, as\nconnected with the question of the nature of art and its origin in\nmorality, he was struck with the fact that all the virtues of the Swiss\ndid not make them artistic. Compared with most nations they were as\nchildren in painting, music and poetry. And, indeed, they ranked with\nthe early phases of many great nations--the period of pristine\nsimplicity \"uncorrupted by the arts.\"\n\nFrom Bellinzona he went to Turin on his way to the Vaudois Valleys,\nwhere he meant to compare the Waldensian Protestants with the Swiss.\nAccidentally he saw Paul Veronese's \"Queen of Sheba\" and other Venetian\npictures; and so fell to comparing a period of fully ripened art with\none of artlessness; discovering that the mature art, while it appeared\nat the same time with decay in morals, did not spring from that decay,\nbut was rooted in the virtues of the earlier age. He grasped a clue to\nthe puzzle, in the generalisation that Art is the product of human\nhappiness; it is contrary to asceticism; it is the expression of\npleasure. But when the turning point of national progress is once\nreached, and art is regarded as the laborious incitement to\npleasure,--no longer the spontaneous blossom and fruit of it,--the\ndecay sets in for art as for morality. Art, in short, is created _by_\npleasure, not _for_ pleasure. The standard of thought, the attitude of\nmind, of the Waldensians, he now perceived to be quite impossible for\nhimself. He could not look upon every one outside their fold as heathens\nand publicans; he could not believe that the pictures of Paul Veronese\nwere works of iniquity, nor that the motives of great deeds in earlier\nages were lying superstitions. He took courage to own to himself and\nothers that it was no longer any use trying to identify his point of\nview with that of Protestantism. He saw both Protestants and Roman\nCatholics, in the perspective of history, converging into a primitive,\nfar distant, ideal unity of Christianity, in which he still believed;\nbut he could take neither side, after this.\n\nThe first statement of the new point of view was, as we said, the\nInaugural Lecture of the Cambridge School of Art. The next important\nutterance was at Manchester, February 22nd, 1859, where he spoke on the\n\"Unity of Art,\" by which he meant--not the fraternity of handicrafts\nwith painting, as the term is used nowadays--but that, in whatever\nbranch of Art, the spirit of Truth or Sincerity is the same. In this\nlecture there is a very important passage showing how he had at last got\nupon firm ground in the question of art and morality: \"_I do_ NOT _say\nin the least that in order to be a good painter you must be a good man_;\nbut I do say that in order to be a good natural painter there must be\nstrong elements of good in the mind, however warped by other parts of\nthe character.\" So emphatic a statement deserves more attention than it\nhas received from readers and writers who assume to judge Ruskin's views\nafter a slight acquaintance with his earlier works. He was well aware\nhimself that his mind had been gradually enlarging, and his thoughts\nchanging; and he soon saw as great a difference between himself at forty\nand at twenty-five, as he had formerly seen between the Boy poet and the\nArt critic. He became as anxious to forget his earlier books, as he had\nbeen to forget his verse-writing; and when he came to collect his\n\"Works,\" these lectures, under the title of \"The Two Paths,\" were (with\n\"The Political Economy of Art\") the earliest admitted into the library.\n\nAfter this Manchester lecture he took a driving tour in\nYorkshire--posting in the old-fashioned way--halting at Bradford for the\nlecture on \"Modern Manufacture and Design\" (March 1st), and ending with\na visit to the school at Winnington, of which more in a later chapter.\n\nIn 1859 the last Academy Notes, for the time being, were published. The\nPre-Raphaelite cause had been fully successful, and the new school of\nnaturalist landscape was rapidly asserting itself. Old friends were\nfailing, such as Stanfield, Lewis, and Roberts: but new men were growing\nup, among whom Ruskin welcomed G.D. Leslie, F. Goodall, J.C. Hook,--who\nhad come out of his \"Pre-Raphaelite measles\" into the healthy naturalism\nof \"Luff Boy!\"--Clarence Whaite, Henry Holiday, and John Brett, who\nshowed the \"Val d'Aosta.\" Millais' \"Vale of Rest\" was the picture which\nattracted most notice: something of the old rancour against the school\nwas revived in the _Morning Herald_, which called his works\n\"impertinences,\" \"contemptible,\" \"indelible disgrace,\" and so on. It was\nthe beginning of a transition from the delicacy of the Pre-Raphaelite\nMillais to his later style; and as such the preacher of \"All great art\nis delicate\" could not entirely defend it. But the serious strength of\nthe imagination and the power of the execution he praised with\nunexpected warmth.\n\nHe then started on the last tour abroad with his parents. He had been\nasked, rather pointedly, by the National Gallery Commission, whether he\nhad seen the great German museums, and had been obliged to reply that he\nhad not. Perhaps it occurred to him or to his father that he ought to\nsee the pictures at Berlin and Dresden and Munich, even though he\nheartily disliked the Germans with their art and their language and\neverything that belonged to them,--except Holbein and D\u00fcrer. By the end\nof July the travellers were in North Switzerland; and they spent\nSeptember in Savoy, returning home by October 7th.\n\nOld Mr. Ruskin was now in his seventy-fifth year and his desire was to\nsee the great work finished before he died. There had been some attempt\nto write this last volume of \"Modern Painters\" in the previous winter,\nbut it had been put off until after the visit to Germany had completed a\nstudy of the great Venetian painters--especially Titian and Veronese.\nNow at last, in the autumn of 1859, he finally set to work on the\nwriting.\n\nThe assertion of Turner's genius had been necessary in 1843, but Turner\nwas long since dead; his fame was thoroughly vindicated; his bequest to\nthe nation dealt with, so far as possible. Early Christian Art was\nrecognised--almost beyond its claims. The Pre-Raphaelites and\nnaturalistic landscapists no longer needed the hand which \"Modern\nPainters\" had held out to them by the way. Of the great triad of Venice,\nTintoret had been expounded, Veronese and Titian were now taken up and\ntreated with tardy, but ample recognition.\n\nAnd now, after twenty years of labour, Ruskin had established himself as\nthe recognised leader of criticism and the exponent of painting and\narchitecture. He had created a department of literature all his own. He\nhad enriched the art of England with examples of a new and beautiful\ndraughtsmanship, and the language with passages of poetic description\nand eloquent declamation, quite, in their way, unrivalled. He had built\nup a theory of art, so far uncontested; and thrown new light on the\nMiddle Ages and Renaissance, illustrating, in a way then novel, their\nchronicles by their remains. He had beaten down opposition, risen above\ndetraction, and won the prize of honour--only to realise, as he received\nit, that the fight had been but a pastime tournament, after all; and to\nhear, through the applause, the enemy's trumpet sounding to battle. For\nnow, without the camp, there were realities to face; as to Art--\"the\nbest in this kind are but shadows.\"\n\n\n\n\nBOOK III\n\nHERMIT AND HERETIC\n\n(1860-1870)\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\n\"UNTO THIS LAST\" (1860-1861)\n\n\nAt forty years of age Ruskin finished \"Modern Painters.\" From that time\nart was sometimes his text, rarely his theme. He used it as the\nopportunity, the vehicle, so to say, for teachings of wider range and\ndeeper import; teachings about life as a whole, conclusions in ethics\nand economics and religion, to which he sought to lead others, as he was\nled, by the way of art.\n\nDuring the time when he was preaching his later doctrines, he wished to\nsuppress the interfering evidences of the earlier. He let his works on\nart run out of print, not for the benefit of second-hand booksellers,\nbut in the hope that he could fix his audience upon the burden of his\nprophecy for the time being. But the youthful works were still read;\nhigh prices were paid for them, or they were smuggled in from America.\nAnd when the epoch of \"Fors\" had passed, he agreed to the reprinting of\nall that early material. He called it obsolete and trivial; others find\nit interestingly biographical--perhaps even classical.\n\nThis year, then, 1860, the year of the Italian Kingdom, of Garibaldi,\nand of the beginning of the American war, marks his turning point, from\nthe early work, summed up in the old \"Selections,\" to the later work.\n\nUntil he was forty, Mr. Ruskin was a writer on art; after that his art\nwas secondary to ethics. Until he was forty he was a believer in English\nProtestantism; afterwards he could not reconcile current beliefs with\nthe facts of life as he saw them, and had to reconstruct his creed from\nthe foundations. Until he was forty he was a philanthropist, working\nheartily with others in a definite cause, and hoping for the amendment\nof wrongs, without a social upheaval. Even in the beginning of 1860, in\nhis evidence before the House of Commons Select Committee on Public\nInstitutions, he was ready with plans for amusing and instructing the\nlabouring classes, and noting in them a \"thirsty desire\" for\nimprovement. But while his readiness to make any personal sacrifice, in\nthe way of social and philanthropic experiment, and his interest in the\nquestion were increasing, he became less and less sanguine about the\nvalue of such efforts as the Working Men's College, and less and less\nready to co-operate with others in their schemes. He began to see that\nno tinkering at social breakages was really worth while; that far more\nextensive repairs were needed to make the old ship seaworthy.\n\nSo he set himself, by himself, to sketch the plans for the repairs.\nNaturally sociable, and accustomed to the friendly give-and-take of a\nwide acquaintance, he withdrew from the busy world into a busier\nsolitude. During the next few years he lived much alone among the Alps,\nor at home, thinking out the problem; sometimes feeling, far more\nacutely than was good for clear thought, the burden of the mission that\nwas laid upon him. In March, 1863, he wrote from his retreat at Mornex\nto Norton:\n\n\n     \"The loneliness is very great, and the peace in which I am at\n     present is only as if I had buried myself in a tuft of grass on a\n     battlefield wet with blood--for the cry of the earth about me is in\n     my ears continually, if I do not lay my head to the very ground.\"\n\nAnd a few months later:\n\n\n     \"I am still very unwell, and tormented between the longing for rest\n     and lovely life, and the sense of this terrific call of human crime\n     for resistance and of human misery for help, though it seems to me\n     as the voice of a river of blood which can but sweep me down in the\n     midst of its black clots, helpless.\"\n\nSentences like these, passages here and there in the last volume of\n\"Modern Painters,\" and still more, certain passages omitted from that\nvolume, show that about 1860 something of a cloud had been settling over\nhim,--a sense of the evil of the world, a horror of great darkness. In\nhis earlier years, his intense emotion and vivid imagination had enabled\nhim to read into pictures of Tintoret or Turner, into scenes of nature\nand sayings of great books, a meaning or a moral which he so vividly\ncommunicated to the reader as to make it thenceforward part and parcel\nof the subject, however it came there to begin with. It is useless to\nwonder whether Turner, for instance, consciously meant what Ruskin found\nin his works. A great painter does not paint without thought, and such\nthought is apt to show itself whether he will or no. But it needs\nimaginative sympathy to detect and describe the thought. And when that\nsympathy was given to suffering, to widespread misery, to crying wrongs;\njoined also with an intense passion for justice, which had already shown\nitself in the defence of slighted genius and neglected art; and to the\nCeltic temperament of some highstrung seer and trance-prophesying bard;\nit was no wonder that Ruskin became like one of the hermits of old, who\nretreated from the world to return upon it with stormy messages of\nawakening and flashes of truth more impressive, more illuminating than\nthe logic of schoolmen and the state-craft of the wise.\n\nAnd then he began to take up an attitude of antagonism to the world, he\nwho had been the kindly helper and minister of delightful art. He began\nto call upon those who had ears to hear to come out and be separate\nfrom the ease and hypocrisy of Vanity Fair. Its respectabilities, its\northodoxies, he could no longer abide. Orthodox religion, orthodox\nmorals and politics, orthodox art and science, alike he rejected; and\nwas rejected by each of them as a brawler, a babbler, a fanatic, a\nheretic. And even when kindly Oxford gave him a quasi-academical\nposition, it did not bring him, as it brings many a heretic, back to the\nfold.\n\nIn this period of storm and stress he stood alone. The old friends of\nhis youth were one by one passing away, if not from intercourse, still\nfrom full sympathy with him in his new mood. His parents were no longer\nthe guides and companions they had been; they did not understand the\nbusiness he was about. And so he was left to new associates, for he\ncould not live without some one to love,--that was the nature of the\nman, however lonely in his work and wanderings.\n\nThe new friends of this period were, at first, Americans; as the chief\nnew friends of his latest period (the Alexanders) were American, too.\nCharles Eliot Norton, after being introduced to him in London in 1855,\nmet him again by accident on the Lake of Geneva--the story is prettily\ntold in \"Pr\u00e6terita.\" Ruskin adds:\n\n\n     \"Norton saw all my weaknesses, measured all my narrownesses, and,\n     from the first, took serenely, and as it seemed of necessity, a\n     kind of paternal authority over me, and a right of guidance.... I\n     was entirely conscious of his rectorial power, and affectionately\n     submissive to it, so that he might have done anything with me, but\n     for the unhappy difference in our innate, and unchangeable,\n     political faiths.\"\n\nSo, after all, he stood alone.\n\nAnother friend about this time was Mrs. H. Beecher Stowe, to whom he\nwrote on June 18th, 1860, from Geneva:\n\n\n     \"It takes a great deal, when I am at Geneva, to make me wish myself\n     anywhere else, and, of all places else, in London; nevertheless, I\n     very heartily wish at this moment that I were looking out on the\n     Norwood Hills, and were expecting you and the children to breakfast\n     to-morrow.\n\n     \"I had very serious thoughts, when I received your note, of running\n     home; but I expected that very day an American friend, Mr.\n     Stillman, who, I thought, would miss me more here than you in\n     London, so I stayed.\n\n     \"What a dreadful thing it is that people should have to go to\n     America again, after coming to Europe! It seems to me an inversion\n     of the order of nature. I think America is a sort of 'United'\n     States of Probation, out of which all wise people, being once\n     delivered, and having obtained entrance into this better world,\n     should never be expected to return (sentence irremediably\n     ungrammatical), particularly when they have been making themselves\n     cruelly pleasant to friends here. My friend Norton, whom I met\n     first on this very blue lake water, had no business to go back to\n     Boston again, any more than you....\n\n     \"So you have been seeing the Pope and all his Easter performances!\n     I congratulate you, for I suppose it is something like 'Positively\n     the last appearance on any stage.' What was the use of thinking\n     about _him_? You should have had your own thoughts about what was\n     to come after him. I don't mean that Roman Catholicism will die out\n     so quickly. It will last pretty nearly as long as Protestantism,\n     which keeps it up; but I wonder what is to come next. That is the\n     main question just now for everybody.\"\n\nW.J. Stillman had been a correspondent about 1851,--\"involved in\nmystical speculations, partly growing out of the second volume of\n'Modern Painters,'\" as he said of himself in an article on \"John Ruskin\"\nin the _Century_ Magazine (January, 1888). With him Ruskin spent July\nand August of 1860 at Chamouni. He did but little drawing, and in the\nfew sketches that remain of that summer there is evidence that his mind\nwas far away from its old love of mountains and of streamlets. His\nlonely walks in the pinewoods of the Arveron were given to meditation on\na great problem which had been set, as it seemed, for him to solve, ever\nsince he had written that chapter on \"The Nature of Gothic.\" Now at\nlast, in the solitude of the Alps, he could grapple with the questions\nhe had raised; and the outcome of the struggle was \"Unto this Last.\"\n\nThe year before, from Thun and Bonneville and Lausanne (August and\nSeptember, 1859) he had written letters to E.S. Dallas, suggested by the\nstrikes in the London building trade. In these he appears to have\nsketched the outline of a new conception of social science, which he was\nnow elaborating with more attempt at system and brevity than he had been\naccustomed to use.\n\nThese new papers, painfully thought out and carefully set down in his\nroom at the H\u00f4tel de l'Union, he used--as long before he read his daily\nchapter to the breakfast party at Herne Hill--to read to Stillman: and\nhe sent them to the _Cornhill Magazine_, started the year before by\nSmith and Elder. Ruskin had already contributed to it a paper on \"Sir\nJoshua and Holbein,\" a stray chapter from Vol. V., \"Modern Painters.\"\nHis reputation as a writer and philanthropist, together with the\nfriendliness of editor and publisher, secured the insertion of the first\nthree,--from August to October. The editor then wrote to say that they\nwere so unanimously condemned and disliked, that, with all apologies, he\ncould only admit one more. The series was brought hastily to a\nconclusion in November: and the author, beaten back as he had never been\nbeaten before, dropped the subject, and \"sulked,\" so he called it, all\nthe winter.\n\nIt is pleasant to notice that neither Thackeray, the editor nor Smith,\nthe publisher quarrelled with the author who had laid them open to the\ncensure of their public,--nor he with them. On December 21st, he wrote\nto Thackeray, in answer apparently, to a letter about lecturing for a\ncharitable purpose: and continued:\n\n\n     \"The mode in which you direct your charity puts me in mind of a\n     matter that has lain long on my mind, though I never have had the\n     time or face to talk to you of it. In somebody's drawing-room,\n     ages ago, you were speaking accidentally of M. de Marvy.[8] I\n     expressed my great obligation to him; on which you said that I\n     could prove my gratitude, if I chose, to his widow,--which choice I\n     then not accepting, have ever since remembered the circumstance as\n     one peculiarly likely to add, so far as it went, to the general\n     impression on your mind of the hollowness of people's sayings and\n     hardness of their hearts. The fact is, I give what I give almost in\n     an opposite way to yours. I think there are many people who will\n     relieve hopeless distress for one who will help at a hopeful pinch;\n     and when I have the choice I nearly always give where I think the\n     money will be fruitful rather than merely helpful. I would lecture\n     for a school when I would _not_ for a distressed author; and would\n     have helped De Marvy to perfect his invention, but not--unless I\n     had no other object--his widow after he was gone. In a word, I like\n     to prop the falling more than to feed the fallen.\"\n\n[Footnote 8: Louis Marvy, an engraver, and political refugee after the\nFrench Revolution of 1848. He produced the plates, and Thackeray the\ntext, of \"Landscape Painters of England, in a series of steel\nengravings, with short Notices.\"]\n\nThe winter passed without any great undertaking. G.F. Watts proposed to\nadd Ruskin's portrait to his gallery of celebrities; but he was in no\nmood to sit. Rossetti did, however, sketch him this year. In March he\npresented eighty-three Turner drawings to Oxford, and twenty-five to\nCambridge. The address of thanks with the great seal of Oxford\nUniversity is dated March 23rd, 1861; the Catalogue of the Cambridge\ncollection is dated May 28th.\n\nOn April 2nd he addressed the St. George's Mission Working Men's\nInstitute, and shortly afterwards, though at this time in a much\nenfeebled state of health, gave a lecture before \"a most brilliant\naudience,\" as the _London Review_ reported, at the Royal Institution\n(April 19th, 1861). Carlyle wrote to his brother John:\n\n\n     \"Friday last I was persuaded--in fact had inwardly compelled myself\n     as it were--to a lecture of Ruskin's at the Institution, Albemarle\n     Street, Lecture on Tree Leaves as physiological, pictorial, moral,\n     symbolical objects. A crammed house, but tolerable even to me in\n     the gallery. The lecture was thought to 'break down,' and indeed it\n     quite did '_as a lecture_'; but only did from _embarras de\n     richesses_--a rare case. Ruskin did blow asunder as by gunpowder\n     explosions his leaf notions, which were manifold, curious, genial;\n     and in fact, I do not recollect to have heard in that place any\n     neatest thing I liked so well as this chaotic one.\"\n\nPapers on \"Illuminated Manuscripts\" (read before the Society of\nAntiquaries on June 6th) and on \"The Preservation of Ancient Buildings\"\n(read to the Ecclesiological Society a fortnight later) show that old\ninterests were not wholly forgotten, even in the stress of new pursuits,\nby this man of many-sided activity.\n\nDuring May, 1861, he paid a visit to the school girls at Winnington, in\nJune and July he took a holiday at Boulogne with the fisher folk, in\nAugust he went to Ireland as guest of the Latouches of Harristown,\nCounty Kildare, and in September he returned to the Alps, spending the\nrest of the year at Bonneville and Lucerne.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\n\"MUNERA PULVERIS\" (1862)\n\n\nAfter an autumn among the Alps, hearing that the Turner drawings in the\nNational Gallery had been mildewed, he ran home to see about them in\nJanuary 1862; and was kept until the end of May. He found that his\npolitical economy work was not such a total failure as it had seemed.\nFroude, then editor of _Fraser's Magazine_, thought there was something\nin it, and would give him another chance. So, by way of a fresh start,\nhe had his four _Cornhill_ articles published in book form; and almost\nsimultaneously, in June 1862 the first of the new series appeared.\n\nThe author had then returned to Lucerne with Mr. and Mrs. Burne-Jones,\nwith whom he crossed the St. Gothard to Milan, where he tried to forget\nthe harrowing of hell in a close study of Luini, and in copying the \"St.\nCatherine\" now at Oxford. Ruskin has never said so much about Luini as,\nperhaps, he intended. A short notice in the \"Cestus of Aglaia,\" and\noccasional references scattered up and down his later works, hardly give\nthe prominence in his writings that the painter held in his thoughts. It\nwas about this time that he was made an Hon. Member of the Florentine\nAcademy.\n\nHe re-crossed the Alps, and settled to his work on political economy at\nMornex, where he spent the winter except for a short run home, which\ngave him the opportunity of addressing the Working Men's College on\nNovember 29.\n\nHis retreat is described in one of his letters home:\n\n\n     \"MORNEX, _August_ 31 (1862).\n\n     \"MY DEAREST MOTHER,\n\n     \"This ought to arrive on the evening before your birthday: it is\n     not possible to reach you in the morning, not even by telegraph as\n     I once did from Mont Cenis, for--(may Heaven be devoutly thanked\n     therefore)--there are yet on Mont Sal\u00e8ve neither rails nor\n     wires....\n\n     \"The place I have got to is at the end of all carriage-roads, and I\n     am not yet strong enough to get farther, on foot, than a five or\n     six miles' circle, within which is assuredly no house to my mind. I\n     cast, at first, somewhat longing eyes on a true Savoyard\n     ch\u00e2teau--notable for its lovely garden and orchard--and its\n     unspoiled, unrestored, arched gateway between two round turrets,\n     and Gothic-windowed keep. But on examination of the\n     interior--finding the walls, though six feet thick, rent to the\n     foundation--and as cold as rocks, and the floors all sodden through\n     with walnut oil and rotten-apple juice--heaps of the farm stores\n     having been left to decay in the ci-devant drawing room, I gave up\n     all medieval ideas, for which the long-legged black pigs who lived\n     like gentlemen at ease in the passage, and the bats and spiders who\n     divided between them the corners of the turret-stair, have\n     reason--if they knew it--to be thankful.\n\n     \"The worst of it is that I never had the gift, nor have I now the\n     energy, to _make_ anything of a place; so that I shall have to put\n     up with almost anything I can find that is healthily habitable in a\n     good situation. Meantime, the air here being delicious and the\n     rooms good enough for use and comfort, I am not troubling myself\n     much, but trying to put myself into better health and humour; in\n     which I have already a little succeeded.\"\n\nAfter describing the flowers of the Sal\u00e8ve he continues:\n\n\n     \"My Father would be quite wild at the 'view' from the garden\n     terrace--but he would be disgusted at the shut in feeling of the\n     house, which is in fact as much shut in as our old Herne Hill one;\n     only to get the 'view' I have but to go as far down the garden as\n     to our old 'mulberry tree.' By the way there's a magnificent\n     mulberry tree, as big as a common walnut, covered with black and\n     red fruit on the other side of the road. Coutet and Allen are very\n     anxious to do all they can now that Crawley is away; and I don't\n     think I shall manage very badly,\" etc.\n\nA little later he took in addition a cottage in which the Empress of\nRussia had once stayed: it commanded a finer view than the larger house,\nwhich has since been turned into a hotel (H\u00f4tel et Pension des\nGlycines). This place was for some time the hermitage in which he wrote\nhis political economy. Of his lonely rambles he wrote later on:\n\n\n     \"If I have a definite point to reach, and common work to do at\n     it--I take people--anybody--with me; but all my best _mental_ work\n     is necessarily done alone; whenever I wanted to think, in Savoy, I\n     used to leave Coutet at home. Constantly I have been alone on the\n     Glacier des Bois--and far among the loneliest aiguille recesses. I\n     found the path up the Brezon above Bonneville in a lonely walk one\n     Sunday; I saw the grandest view of the Alps of Savoy I ever\n     gained, on the 2nd of January, 1862, alone among the snow wreaths\n     on the summit of the Sal\u00e8ve. You need not fear for me on 'Langdale\n     Pikes' after that.\"\n\nIn September the second article appeared in _Fraser._ \"Only a genius\nlike Mr. Ruskin could have produced such hopeless rubbish,\" says a\nnewspaper of the period. Far worse than any newspaper criticism was the\ncondemnation of Denmark Hill. His father, whose eyes had glistened over\nearly poems and prose eloquence, strongly disapproved of this heretical\neconomy. It was a bitter thing that his son should become prodigal of a\nhardly earned reputation, and be pointed at for a fool. And it was\nintensely painful for a son \"who had never given his father a pang that\ncould be avoided,\" as old Mr. Ruskin had once written, to find his\nfather, with one foot in the grave, turning against him. In December the\nthird paper appeared. History repeated itself, and with the fourth paper\nthe heretic was gagged. A year after, his father died; and these\n_Fraser_ articles were laid aside until the end of 1871, when they were\ntaken up again, and published on New Year's Day 1872, as \"Munera\nPulveris.\"\n\nFrom the outset, however, he was not without supporters. Carlyle wrote\non June 30, 1862:\n\n\n     \"I have read, a month ago, your _First_ in _Fraser_, and ever since\n     have had a wish to say to it and you, _Euge macte nova virtute._ I\n     approved in every particular; calm, definite, clear; rising into\n     the sphere of _Plato_ (our almost best), wh'h in exchange for the\n     sphere of _Macculloch, Mill and Co._ is a mighty improvement! Since\n     that, I have seen the little _green_ book, too; reprint of your\n     _Cornhill_ operations,--about 2/3 of wh'h was read to me (_known_\n     only from what the contradict'n of sinners had told me of it);--in\n     every part of wh'h I find a high and noble sort of truth, not one\n     doctrine that I can intrinsically dissent from, or count other than\n     salutary in the extreme, and pressingly needed in Engl'd above\n     all.\"\n\nErskine of Linlathen wrote to Carlyle, August 7th, 1862:\n\n\n     \"I am thankful for any unveiling of the so-called science of\n     political economy, according to which, avowed selfishness is the\n     Rule of the World. It is indeed most important preaching--to preach\n     that there is not one God for religion and another God for human\n     fellowship--and another God for buying and selling--that pestilent\n     polytheism has been largely and confidently preached in our time,\n     and blessed are those who can detect its mendacities, and help to\n     disenchant the brethren of their power....\"\n\nJ.A. Froude, then editor of _Fraser_, and to his dying day Mr. Ruskin's\nintimate and affectionate friend, wrote to him on October 24 (1862?):\n\n\n     \"The world talks of the article in its usual way. I was at\n     Carlyle's last night.... He said that in writing to your father as\n     to subject he had told him that when Solomon's temple was building\n     it was credibly reported that at least 10,000 sparrows sitting on\n     the trees round declared that it was entirely wrong--quite contrary\n     to received opinion--hopelessly condemned by public opinion, etc.\n     Nevertheless it got finished and the sparrows flew away and began\n     to chirp in the same note about something else.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nTHE LIMESTONE ALPS (1863)\n\n\nOur hermit among the Alps of Savoy differed in one respect from his\npredecessors. They, for the most part, saw nothing in the rocks and\nstones around them except the prison walls of their seclusion; he could\nnot be within constant sight of the mountains without thinking over the\nwonders of their scenery and structure. And it was well for him that it\ncould be so. The terrible depression of mind which his social and\nphilanthropic work had brought on, found a relief in the renewal of his\nold mountain-worship. After sending off the last of his _Fraser_ papers,\nin which, when the verdict had twice gone against him, he tried to show\ncause why sentence should not be passed, the strain was at its severest.\nHe felt, as few others not directly interested felt, the sufferings of\nthe outcast in English slums and Savoyard hovels; and heard the cry of\nthe oppressed in Poland and in Italy: and he had been silenced. What\ncould he do but, as he said in the letters to Norton, \"lay his head to\nthe very ground,\" and try to forget it all among the stones and the\nsnows?\n\nHe wandered about geologizing, and spent a while at Talloires on the\nLake of Annecy, where the old Abbey had been turned into an inn, and one\nslept in a monk's cell and meditated in the cloister of the monastery,\nSt. Bernard of Menthon's memory haunting the place, and St. Germain's\ncave close by in the rocks above. At the end of May he came back to\nEngland, and was invited to lecture again at the Royal Institution. The\nsubject he chose was \"The Stratified Alps of Savoy.\"\n\nAt that time many distinguished foreign geologists were working at the\nAlps; but little of conclusive importance had been published, except in\npapers embedded in Transactions of various societies. Professor Alphonse\nFavre's great work did not appear until 1867, and the \"Mechanismus der\nGebirgsbildung\" of Professor Heim not till 1878; so that for an English\npublic the subject was a fresh one. To Ruskin it was familiar: he had\nbeen elected a Fellow of the Geological Society in 1840, at the age of\ntwenty-one; he had worked through Savoy with his Saussure in hand nearly\nthirty years before, and, many a time since that, had spent the\nintervals of literary business in rambling and climbing with the hammer\nand note-book. In the field he had compared Studer's meagre sections,\nand consulted the available authorities on physical geology, though he\nhad never entered upon the more popular sister-science of palaeontology.\nHe left the determination of strata to specialists: his interest was\nfixed on the structure of mountains--the relation of geology to scenery;\na question upon which he had some right to be heard, as knowing more\nabout scenery than most geologists, and more about geology than most\nartists.\n\nAs examples of Savoy mountains this lecture described in detail the\nSal\u00e8ve, on which he had been living for two winters, and the Brezon, the\ntop of which he had tried to buy from the commune of Bonneville--one of\nhis many plans for settling among the Alps. The commune thought he had\nfound a gold-mine up there, and raised the price out of all reason.\nOther attempts to make a home in the ch\u00e2teaux or chalets of Savoy were\nfoiled, or abandoned, like his earlier idea to live in Venice. But his\nscrambles on the Sal\u00e8ve led him to hesitate in accepting the explanation\ngiven by Alphonse Favre of the curious north-west face of steeply\ninclined vertical slabs, which he suspected to be created by cleavage,\non the analogy of other Jurassic precipices. The Brezon--_brisant_,\nbreaking wave--he took as type of the billowy form of limestone Alps in\ngeneral, and his analysis of it was serviceable and substantially\ncorrect.\n\nThis lecture was followed in 1864 by desultory correspondence with Mr.\nJukes and others in _The Reader_, in which he merely restated his\nconclusions, too slightly to convince. Had he devoted himself to a\nthorough examination of the subject--but this is in the region of what\nmight have been. He was more seriously engaged in other pursuits, of\nmore immediate importance. Three days after his lecture he was being\nexamined before the Royal Academy Commission, and after a short summer\nvisit to various friends in the north of England, he set out again for\nthe Alps, partly to study the geology of Chamouni and North Switzerland,\npartly to continue his drawings of Swiss towns at Baden and Lauffenburg,\nwith his pupil John Bunney. But even there the burden of his real\nmission could not be shaken off, and though again seeking health and a\nquiet mind, he could not quite keep silence, but wrote letters to\nEnglish newspapers on the depreciation of gold (repeating his theory of\ncurrency), and on the wrongs of Poland and Italy; and he put together\nmore papers, not then published, in continuation of his \"Munera\nPulveris.\"\n\nSince about 1850, Carlyle had been gradually becoming more and more\nfriendly with John Ruskin; and now that this social and economical work\nhad been taken up, he began to have a real esteem for him, though always\nwith a patronizing tone, which the younger man's open and confessed\ndiscipleship accepted and encouraged. This letter especially shows both\nmen in an unaccustomed light: Ruskin, hating tobacco, sends his \"master\"\ncigars; Carlyle, hating cant, replies rather in the tone of the\ntemperance advocate, taking a little wine for his stomach's sake:\n\n\n     \"CHELSEA, 22 _Feby_, 1865\n\n     \"DEAR RUSKIN,\n\n     \"You have sent me a munificent Box of Cigars; for wh'h what can I\n     say in ans'r? It makes me both sad and glad. _Ay de mi._\n\n    \"We are such stuff,\n    Gone with a puff--Then\n    think, and smoke Tobacco!'\n\n     \"The Wife also has had her Flowers; and a letter wh'h has charmed\n     the female mind. You forgot only the first chapter of\n     'Aglaia';--don't forget; and be a good boy for the future.\n\n     \"The Geology Book wasn't _Jukes_; I found it again in the\n     Magazine,--reviewed there: 'Phillips,'[9] is there such a name? It\n     has ag'n escaped me. I have a notion to come out actually some day\n     soon; and take a serious Lecture from you on what you really know,\n     and can give me some intelligible outline of, ab't the\n     Rocks,--_bones_ of our poor old Mother; wh'h have always been\n     venerable and strange to me. Next to nothing of rational could I\n     ever learn of the subject....\n\n     [Footnote 9: \"Jukes,\"--Mr. J.B. Jukes, F.R.S., with whom Ruskin had\n     been discussing in _The Reader_. \"Phillips,\" the Oxford Professor\n     of Geology, and a friend of Ruskin's.]\n\n     \"Yours ever,\n\n     \"T. CARLYLE.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\n\"SESAME AND LILIES\" (1864)\n\n\nWider aims and weaker health had not put an end to Ruskin's connection\nwith the Working Men's College, though he did not now teach a\ndrawing-class regularly. He had, as he said, \"the satisfaction of\nknowing that they had very good masters in Messrs. Lowes Dickinson,\nJeffery and Cave Thomas,\" and his work was elsewhere. He was to have\nlectured there on December 19th, 1863; but he did not reach home until\nabout Christmas; better than he had been; and ready to give the promised\naddress on January 30th, 1864. Beside which he used to visit the place\noccasionally of an evening to take note of progress, and some of his\npupils were now more directly under his care.\n\nIt was from one of these visits to the College, on February 27th, that\nhe returned, past midnight, and found his father waiting up for him, to\nread some letters he had written. Next morning the old man, close upon\nseventy-nine years of age, was struck with his last illness; and died on\nMarch 3rd. He was buried at Shirley Church, near Addington, in Surrey,\nnot far from Croydon; and the legend on his tomb records: \"He was an\nentirely honest merchant, and his memory is, to all who keep it, dear\nand helpful. His son, whom he loved to the uttermost, and taught to\nspeak truth, says this of him.\"\n\nMr. John James Ruskin, like many other of our successful merchants, had\nbeen an open-handed patron of art, and a cheerful giver, not only to\nneedy friends and relatives, but also to various charities. For example,\nas a kind of personal tribute to Osborne Gordon, his son's tutor, he\ngave \u00a35,000 toward the augmentation of poor Christ-Church livings. His\nson's open-handed way with dependants and servants was learned from the\nold merchant, who, unlike many hard-working money-makers, was always\nready to give, though he could not bear to lose. In spite of which he\nleft a considerable fortune behind him,--considerable when it is\nunderstood to be the earnings of his single-handed industry and steady\nsagacity in legitimate business, without indulgence in speculation. He\nleft \u00a3120,000 with various other property, to his son. To his wife he\nleft his house and \u00a337,000, and a void which it seemed at first nothing\ncould fill. For of late years the son had drifted out of their horizon,\nwith ideas on religion and the ordering of life so very different from\ntheirs; and had been much away from home--he sometimes said, selfishly,\nbut not without the greatest of all excuses, necessity. And so the two\nold people had been brought closer than ever together; and she had lived\nentirely for her husband. But, as Browning said,--\"Put a stick in\nanywhere, and she will run up it\"--so the brave old lady did not faint\nunder the blow, and fade away, but transferred her affections and\ninterests to her son. Before his father's death the difference of\nfeeling between them, arising out of the heretical economy, had been\nhealed. Old Mr. Ruskin's will treated his son with all confidence in\nspite of his unorthodox views and unbusiness-like ways. And for nearly\neight years longer his mother lived on, to see him pass through his\nprobation-period into such recognition as an Oxford Professorship\nimplied, and to find in her last years his later books \"becoming more\nand more what they always ought to have been\" to her.\n\nAt the same time, her failing sight and strength needed a constant\nhousehold companion. Her son, though he did not leave home yet awhile\nfor any long journeys, could not be always with her. Only six weeks\nafter the funeral he was called away for a time to fulfil a\nlecture-engagement at Bradford. Before going he brought his pretty young\nScotch cousin. Miss Joanna Ruskin Agnew, to Denmark Hill for a week's\nvisit. She recommended herself at once to the old lady, and to Carlyle,\nwho happened to call, by her frank good-nature and unquenchable spirits;\nand her visit lasted seven years, until she was married to Arthur\nSevern, son of the Ruskins' old friend, Joseph Severn, British Consul at\nRome. Even then she was not allowed far out of their sight, but settled\nin the old house at Herne Hill: \"nor virtually,\" said Ruskin in the last\nchapter of \"Pr\u00e6terita,\" \"have she and I ever parted since.\"\n\nAll through that year he remained at home, except for short necessary\nvisits, and frequent evenings with Carlyle. And when, in December, he\ngave those lectures in Manchester which afterwards, as \"Sesame and\nLilies,\" became his most popular work, we can trace his better health of\nmind and body in the brighter tone of his thought. We can hear the echo\nof Carlyle's talk in the heroic, aristocratic, Stoic ideals, and in the\ninsistence on the value of books and free public libraries,[10]--Carlyle\nbeing the founder of the London Library. And we may suspect that his\nthoughts on women's influence and education had been not a little\ndirected by those months in the company of \"the dear old lady and ditto\nyoung\" to whom Carlyle used to send his love.\n\n[Footnote 10: The first lecture, \"Of Kings' Treasuries,\" was given,\nDecember 6th, 1864, at Rusholme Town Hall, Manchester, in aid of a\nlibrary fund for the Rusholme Institute. The second, \"Queens' Gardens,\"\nwas given December 14th, at the Town Hall, King Street, now the Free\nReference Library, Manchester, in aid of schools for Ancoats.]\n\nIn 1864 a new series of papers on Art was begun, the only published\nwork upon Art of all these ten years. The papers ran in _The Art\nJournal_ from January to July, 1865, and from January to April. 1866,\nunder the title of \"The Cestus of Aglaia,\" by which was meant the\nGirdle, or restraining law, of Beauty, as personified in the wife of\nHephaestus, \"the Lord of Labour.\" Their intention was to suggest, and to\nevoke by correspondence, \"some laws for present practice of art in our\nschools, which may be admitted, if not with absolute, at least with a\nsufficient consent, by leading artists.\" As a first step the author\nasked for the elementary rules of drawing. For his own contribution he\nshowed the value of the \"pure line,\" such as he had used in his own\nearly drawings. Later on, he had adopted a looser and more picturesque\nstyle of handling the point; and in the \"Elements of Drawing\" he had\ntaught his readers to take Rembrandt's etchings as exemplary. But now he\nfelt that this \"evasive\" manner, as he called it, had its dangers. And\nso these papers attempted to supersede the amateurish object lesson of\nthe earlier work by stricter rules for a severer style; prematurely, as\nit proved, for the chapters came to an end before the promised code was\nformulated. The same work was taken up again in \"The Laws of F\u00e9sole\";\nbut the use of the pure line, which Ruskin's precepts failed to enforce,\nwas, in the end, taught to the public by the charming practice of Mr.\nWalter Crane and Miss Greenaway.\n\nA lecture at the Camberwell Working Men's Institute on \"Work and Play\"\nwas given on January 24th, 1865; which, as it was printed in \"The Crown\nof Wild Olive,\" we will notice further on. Various letters and papers on\npolitical and social economy and other subjects hardly call for separate\nnotice: with the exception of one very important address to the Royal\nInstitution of British Architects, given May 15th, \"On the Study of\nArchitecture in our Schools.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\n\"ETHICS OF THE DUST\" (1865)\n\n\nWriting to his father from Manchester about the lecture of February 22,\n1859--\"The Unity of Art\"--Ruskin mentions, among various people of\ninterest whom he was meeting, such as Sir Elkanah Armitage and Mrs.\nGaskell, how \"Miss Bell and four young ladies came from Chester to hear\nme, and I promised to pay them a visit on my way home, to their apparent\ngreat contentment.\"\n\nThe visit was paid on his way back from Yorkshire. He wrote:\n\n\n     \"WINNINGTON, NORTHWICH, CHESHIRE.\n\n     \"12 _March_, 1859.\n\n     \"This is such a nice place that I am going to stay till Monday: an\n     enormous old-fashioned house--full of galleries and up and down\n     stairs--but with magnificently large rooms where wanted: the\n     drawing-room is a huge octagon--I suppose at least forty feet\n     high--like the tower of a castle (hung half way up all round with\n     large and beautiful Turner and Raphael engravings) and with a\n     baronial fireplace:--and in the evening, brightly lighted, with the\n     groups of girls scattered round it, it is a quite beautiful scene\n     in its way. Their morning chapel, too, is very interesting:--though\n     only a large room, it is nicely fitted with reading desk and seats\n     like a college chapel, and two pretty and rich stained-glass\n     windows--and well-toned organ. They have morning prayers with only\n     one of the lessons--and without the psalms: but singing the Te Deum\n     or the other hymn--and other choral parts: and as out of the\n     thirty-five or forty girls perhaps twenty-five or thirty have\n     really available voices, well trained and divided, it was\n     infinitely more beautiful than any ordinary church service--like\n     the Trinita di Monte Convent service more than anything else, and\n     must be very good for them, quite different in its effect on their\n     minds from our wretched penance of college chapel.\n\n     \"The house stands in a superb park, full of old trees and sloping\n     down to the river; with a steep bank of trees on the other side;\n     just the kind of thing Mrs. Sherwood likes to describe;--and the\n     girls look all healthy and happy as can be, down to the little\n     six-years-old ones, who I find know me by the fairy tale as the\n     others do by my large books:--so I am quite at home.\n\n     \"They have my portrait in the library with three others--Maurice,\n     the Bp. of Oxford, and Archdeacon Hare,--so that I can't but stay\n     with them over the Sunday.\"\n\nThe principles of Winnington were advanced; the theology--Bishop\nColenso's daughter was among the pupils; the Bishop of Oxford had\nintroduced Ruskin to the managers, who were pleased to invite the\ncelebrated art-critic to visit whenever he travelled that way, whether\nto lecture at provincial towns, or to see his friends in the north, as\nhe often used. And so between March 1859 and May 1868, after which the\nschool was removed, he was a frequent visitor; and not only he, but\nother lions whom the ladies entrapped:--mention has been made in print\n(in \"The Queen of the Air\") of Charles Halle, whom Ruskin met there in\n1863, and greatly admired.\n\n\n     \"I like Mr. and Mrs. Halle so very much,\" he wrote home, \"and am\n     entirely glad to know so great a musician and evidently so good and\n     wise a man. He was very happy yesterday evening, and actually sat\n     down and played quadrilles for us to dance to--which is, in its\n     way, something like Titian sketching patterns for ball-dresses. But\n     afterwards he played Home, sweet Home, with three\n     variations--_quite_ the most wonderful thing I have ever heard in\n     music. Though I was close to the piano, the motion of the fingers\n     was entirely invisible--a mere _mist_ of rapidity; the _hands_\n     moving slowly and softly, and the variation, in the ear, like a\n     murmur of a light fountain, far away. It was beautiful too to see\n     the girls' faces round, the eyes all wet with feeling, and the\n     little coral mouths fixed into little half open gaps with utter\n     intensity of astonishment.\"\n\nRuskin could not be idle on his visits; and as he was never so happy as\nwhen he was teaching somebody, he improved the opportunity by\nexperiments in education permitted there for his sake. Among other\nthings, he devised singing dances for a select dozen of the girls, with\nverses of his own writing; one, a maze to the theme of \"Twist ye, twine\nye,\" based upon the song in \"Guy Mannering,\" but going far beyond the\noriginal motive in its variations weighted with allegoric thought. Deep\nas the feeling of this little poem is, there is a nobler chord struck in\nthe Song of Peace, the battle-cry of the good time coming; in the\nfaith--who else has found it?--that looks forward to no selfish victory\nof narrow aims, but to the full reconciliation of hostile interests and\nthe blind internecine struggle of this perverse world, in the clearer\nlight of the millennial morning.\n\nRuskin's method of teaching, as illustrated in \"Ethics of the Dust,\" has\nbeen variously pooh-poohed by his critics. It has seemed to some absurd\nto mix up Theology, and Crystallography, and Political Economy, and\nMythology, and Moral Philosophy, with the chatter of school-girls and\nthe romps of the playground. But it should be understood, before reading\nthis book, which is practically the report of these Wilmington talks,\nthat it is printed as an illustration of a method. It showed that\nplay-lessons need not want either depth or accuracy; and that the\nrequirement was simply capacity on the part of the teacher.\n\nThe following letter from Carlyle was written in acknowledgment of an\nearly copy of the book, of which the preface is dated Christmas, 1865.\n\n\n     \"CHELSEA,\n\n     \"_20 Decr, 1865._\n\n     \"The 'Ethics of the Dust,' wh'h I devoured with't pause, and intend\n     to look at ag'n, is a most shining Performance! Not for a long\n     while have I read anything tenth-part so radiant with talent,\n     ingenuity, lambent fire (sheet--and _other_ lightnings) of all\n     commendable kinds! Never was such a lecture on _Crystallography_\n     before, had there been nothing else in it,--and there are all\n     manner of things. In power of _expression_ I pronounce it to be\n     supreme; never did anybody who had _such_ things to explain explain\n     them better. And the bit of Egypt'n mythology, the cunning _Dreams_\n     ab't Pthah, Neith, etc., apart from their elucidative quality,\n     wh'h is exquisite, have in them a _poetry_ that might fill any\n     Tennyson with despair. You are very dramatic too; nothing wanting\n     in the stage-direct'ns, in the pretty little indicat'ns: a very\n     pretty stage and _dramatis person\u00e6_ altogeth'r. Such is my first\n     feeling ab't y'r Book, dear R.--Come soon, and I will tell you all\n     the _faults_ of it, if I gradually discover a great many. In fact,\n     _come_ at any rate!\n\n     \"Y'rs ever,\n\n     \"T. CARLYLE.\"\n\nThe Real Little Housewives, to whom the book was dedicated, were not\nquite delighted--at least, they said they were not--at the portraits\ndrawn of them, in their pinafores, so to speak, with some little hints\nat failings and faults which they recognised through the mask of\n_dramatis person\u00e6._ Miss \"Kathleen\" disclaimed the singing of \"Vilikins\nand his Dinah,\" and so on. It is difficult to please everybody. The\npublic did not care about the book; the publisher hoped Mr. Ruskin would\nwrite no more dialogues: and so it remained, little noticed, for twelve\nyears. In 1877 it was republished and found to be interesting, and in\n1905 the 31st thousand (authorised English edition) had been issued. At\nthat time, however, Sesame and Lilies had run to 160,000 copies.\n\nWinnington Hall, the scene of these pastimes, is now, I understand, used\nby Messrs. Brunner, Mond & Co. as a commonroom or clubhouse for the\nstaff in their great scientific industry.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\n\"THE CROWN OF WILD OLIVE\" (1865-1866)\n\n\nMention has been made of an address to working men at the Camberwell\nInstitute, January 24th, 1865. This lecture was published in 1866,\ntogether with two others,[11] under the title of \"The Crown of Wild\nOlive\"--that is to say, the reward of human work, a reward \"which should\nhave been of gold, had not Jupiter been so poor,\" as Aristophanes said.\n\n[Footnote 11: Republished in 1873, with a fourth lecture added, and a\nPreface and notes on the political growth of Prussia, from Carlyle's\n\"Frederick.\"]\n\nTrue work, he said, meant the production (taking the word production in\na broad sense) of the means of life; every one ought to take some share\nin it, according to his powers: some working with the head, some with\nthe hands; but all acknowledging idleness and slavery to be alike\nimmoral. And, as to the remuneration, he said, as he had said before in\n\"Unto this Last,\" Justice demands that equal energy expended should\nbring equal reward. He did not consider it justice to cry out for the\nequalization of incomes, for some are sure to be more diligent and\nsaving than others; some work involves a great preliminary expenditure\nof energy in qualifying the worker, as contrasted with unskilled labour.\nBut he did not allow that the possession of capital entitled a man to\nunearned increment; and he thought that, in a community where a truly\ncivilized morality was highly developed, the general sense of society\nwould recognise an average standard of work and an average standard of\npay for each class.\n\nIn the next two lectures he spoke of the two great forms of Play, the\ngreat Games of Money-making and War. He had been invited to lecture at\nBradford, in the hope that he would give some useful advice towards the\ndesign of a new Exchange which was to be built; in curious\nforgetfulness, it would appear, of his work during the past ten years\nand more. Indeed, the picture he drew them of an ideal \"Temple to the\nGoddess of Getting-on\" was as daring a sermon as ever prophet preached.\nBut when he came to tell them that the employers of labour might be true\ncaptains and kings, the leaders and the helpers of their fellow-men,\nand that the function of commerce was not to prey upon society but to\nprovide for it, there were many of his hearers whose hearts told them\nthat he was right, and whose lives have shown, in some measure, that he\ndid not speak in vain.\n\nStill stranger, to hearers who had not noted the conclusion of his third\nvolume of \"Modern Painters,\" was his view of war, in the address to the\nRoyal Military Academy at Woolwich, in December 1865. The common view of\nwar as destroyer of arts and enemy of morality, the easy acceptance of\nthe doctrine that peace is an unqualified blessing, the obvious evils of\nbattle and rapine and the waste of resources and life throughout so many\nages, have blinded less clear-sighted and less widely-experienced\nthinkers to another side of the teaching of history, which Ruskin dwelt\nupon with unexpected emphasis.\n\nBut modern war, horrible, not from its scale, but from the spirit in\nwhich the upper classes set the lower to fight like gladiators in the\narena, he denounced; and called upon the women of England, with whom, he\nsaid, the real power of life and death lay, to mend it into some\nsemblance of antique chivalry, or to end it in the name of religion and\nhumanity.\n\nIn the _New Review_ for March 1892, there appeared a series of \"Letters\nof John Ruskin to his Secretary,\" which, as the anonymous contributor\nremarked, illustrate \"Ruskin the worker, as he acts away from the eyes\nof the world; Ruskin the epistolographer, when the eventuality of the\nprinting-press is not for the moment before him Ruskin the good\nSamaritan, ever gentle and open-handed when true need and a good cause\nmake appeal to his tender heart; Ruskin the employer, considerate,\ngenerous--an ideal master.\"\n\nCharles Augustus Howell became known to Ruskin (in 1864 or 1865) through\nthe circle of the Pre-Raphaelites; and, as the editor of the letters\nputs it, \"by his talents and assiduity\" became the too-trusted friend\nand _prot\u00e9g\u00e9_ of Ruskin, Rossetti and others of their acquaintance. It\nwas he who proposed and carried out the exhumation, reluctantly\nconsented to, of Rossetti's manuscript poems from his wife's grave, in\nOctober, 1869; for which curious service to literature let him have the\nthanks of posterity. But he was hardly the man to carry out Ruskin's\nsecret charities, and long before he had lost Rossetti's confidence[12]\nhe had ceased to act as Ruskin's secretary.\n\n[Footnote 12: In the manner described by Mr. W.M. Rossetti at p. 351,\nVol. I., of \"D.G. Rossetti, his family letters,\" to which the reader is\nreferred.]\n\nFrom these letters, however, several interesting traits and incidents\nmay be gleaned, such as anecdotes about the canary which was anonymously\nbought at the Crystal Palace Bird Show (February 1866) for the owner's\nbenefit: about the shopboy whom Ruskin was going to train as an artist;\nand about the kindly proposal to employ the aged and impoverished\nCruikshank upon a new book of fairy tales, and the struggle between\nadmiration for the man and admission of his loss of power, ending in the\nfree gift of the hundred pounds promised.\n\nIn April, 1866, after writing the Preface to \"The Crown of Wild Olive,\"\nand preparing the book for publication, Ruskin was carried off to the\nContinent for a holiday with Sir Walter and Lady Trevelyan, her niece\nMiss Constance Hilliard (Mrs. Churchill), and Miss Agnew (Mrs. Severn),\nfor a thorough rest and change after three years of unintermitting work\nin England. They intended to spend a couple of months in Italy. On the\nday of starting, Ruskin called at Cheyne Walk with the usual bouquet for\nMrs. Carlyle, to learn that she had just met with her death, in trying\nto save her little dog, the gift of Lady Trevelyan. He rejoined his\nfriends, and they crossed the Channel gaily, in spite of what they\nthought was rather a cloud over him. At Paris they read the news. \"Yes,\"\nhe said, \"I knew. But there was no reason why I should spoil your\npleasure by telling you.\"\n\nOn his arrival at Dijon he wrote to Carlyle, who in answer after giving\nway to his grief--\"my life all laid in ruins, and the one light of it as\nif gone out,\"--continued:--\"Come and see me when you get home; come\noftener and see me, and speak _more_ frankly to me (for I am very true\nto y'r highest interests and you) while I still remain here. You can do\nnothing for me in Italy; except come home improved.\"\n\nBut before this letter reached Ruskin, he too had been in the presence\nof death, and had lost one of his most valued friends. Their journey to\nItaly had been undertaken chiefly for the sake of Lady Trevelyan's\nhealth, as the following extracts indicate:\n\n\n     \"PARIS, _2nd May, 1866_.\n\n     \"Lady Trevelyan is much better to-day, but it is not safe to move\n     her yet--till to-morrow. So I'm going to take the children to look\n     at Chartres cathedral--we can get three hours there, and be back to\n     seven o'clock dinner. We drove round by St. Cloud and S\u00e8vres\n     yesterday; the blossomed trees being glorious by the Seine,--the\n     children in high spirits. It reminds me always too much of\n     Turner--every bend of these rivers is haunted by him.\"\n\n     \"DIJON, _Sunday, 6th May, 1866_.\n\n     \"Lady Trevelyan is _much_ better, and we hope all to get on to\n     Neufchatel to-morrow. The weather is quite fine again though not\n     warm; and yesterday I took the children for a drive up the little\n     valley which we used to drive through on leaving Dijon for Paris.\n     There are wooded hills on each side, and we got into a sweet\n     valley, as full of nightingales as our garden is of thrushes, and\n     with slopes of broken rocky ground above, covered with the lovely\n     blue milk-wort, and purple columbines, and geranium, and wild\n     strawberry-flowers. The children were intensely delighted, and I\n     took great care that Constance should not run about so as to heat\n     herself, and we got up a considerable bit of hill quite nicely, and\n     with greatly increased appetite for tea, and general mischief. They\n     have such appetites that I generally call them 'my two little\n     pigs.' There is a delightful French waiting-maid at dinner\n     here--who says they are both 'charmantes,' but highly approves of\n     my title for them nevertheless.\"\n\n     \"NEUFCHATEL, _10th May_, 1866.\n\n     \"Lady Trevelyan is still too weak to move. We had (the children and\n     I) a delightful day yesterday at the Pierre \u00e0 Bot, gathering\n     vetches and lilies of the valley in the woods, and picnic\n     afterwards on the lovely mossy grass, in view of all the\n     Alps--Jungfrau, Eiger, Blumlis Alp, Altels, and the rest, with\n     intermediate lake and farmsteads and apple-blossom--very heavenly.\"\n\nHere, within a few days, Lady Trevelyan died. Throughout her illness she\nhad been following the progress of the new notes on wild-flowers\n(afterwards to be \"Proserpina\") with keen interest, and Sir Walter lent\nthe help of botanical science to Ruskin's more poetical and artistic\nobservations. For the sake of this work, and for the \"children,\" and\nwith a wise purpose of bearing up under the heavy blow that had fallen,\nthe two friends continued their journey for a while among the mountains.\n\nFrom Thun they went to Interlachen and the Giessbach. Ruskin occupied\nhimself closely in tracing Studer's sections across the great\nlake-furrow of central Switzerland--\"something craggy for his mind to\nbreak upon,\" as Byron said when he was in trouble. At the Giessbach\nthere was not only geology and divine scenery, enjoyable in lovely\nweather, but an interesting figure in the foreground, the widowed\ndaughter of the hotel landlord, beautiful and consumptive, but brave as\na Swiss girl should be. They all seem to have fallen in love with her,\nso to speak the young English girls as much as the impressionable\nart-critic: and the new human interest in her Alpine tragedy relieved,\nas such interests do, the painfulness of the circumstances through which\nthey had been passing. Her sister Marie was like an Allegra to this\nPenserosa; bright and brilliant in native genius. She played piano-duets\nwith the young ladies; taught Alpine botany to the savants; guided them\nto the secret dells and unknown points of view; and with a sympathy\nunexpected in a stranger, beguiled them out of their grief, and won\ntheir admiration and gratitude. Marie of the Giessbach was often\nreferred to in letters of the time, and for many years after, with\nwarmly affectionate remembrances.\n\nA few bits from his letters to his mother, which I have been permitted\nto copy, will indicate the impressions of this summer's tour.\n\n\n     \"H\u00d4TEL DU GIESBACH, _6th June, 1866_,\n\n     \"MY DEAREST MOTHER,\n\n     \"Can you at all fancy walking out in the morning in a garden full\n     of lilacs just in rich bloom, and pink hawthorn in masses; and\n     along a little terrace with lovely pinks coming into cluster of\n     colour all over the low wall beside it; and a sloping bank of green\n     sward from it--and below that, the Giesbach! Fancy having a real\n     Alpine waterfall in one's garden,--seven hundred feet high. You\n     see, we are just in time for the spring, here, and the strawberries\n     are ripening on the rocks. Joan and Constance have been just\n     scrambling about and gathering them for me. Then there's the\n     blue-green lake below, and Interlaken and the lake of Thun in the\n     distance. I think I never saw anything so beautiful. Joan will\n     write to you about the people, whom she has made great friends\n     with, already.\"\n\n     \"_7th June, 1866_.\n\n     \"I cannot tell you how much I am struck with the beauty of this\n     fall: it is different from everything I have ever seen in torrents.\n     There are so many places where one gets near it without being wet,\n     for one thing; for the falls are, mostly, not vertical so as to fly\n     into mere spray, but over broken rock, which crushes the water into\n     a kind of sugar-candy-like foam, white as snow, yet glittering; and\n     composed, not of bubbles, but of broken-up water. Then I had\n     forgotten that it plunged straight into the lake; I got down to the\n     lake shore on the other side of it yesterday, and to see it plunge\n     clear into the blue water, with the lovely mossy rocks for its\n     flank, and for the lake edge, was an unbelievable kind of thing; it\n     is all as one would fancy cascades in fairyland. I do not often\n     endure with patience any cockneyisms or showings off at these\n     lovely places. But they do one thing here so interesting that I can\n     forgive it. One of the chief cascades (about midway up the hill)\n     falls over a projecting rock, so that one can walk under the\n     torrent as it comes over. It leaps so clear that one is hardly\n     splashed, except at one place. Well, when it gets dark, they burn,\n     for five minutes, one of the strongest steady fireworks of a\n     crimson colour, behind the fall. The red light shines right\n     through, turning the whole waterfall into a torrent of fire.\"\n\n     \"_11th June, 1866._\n\n     \"We leave, according to our programme, for Interlachen\n     to-day,--with great regret, for the peace and sweetness of this\n     place are wonderful and the people are good; and though there is\n     much drinking and quarrelling among the younger men, there appears\n     to be neither distressful poverty, nor deliberate crime: so that\n     there is more of the sense I need, and long for, of fellowship with\n     human creatures, than in any place I have been at for years. I\n     believe they don't so much as lock the house-doors at night; and\n     the faces of the older peasantry are really very beautiful. I have\n     done a good deal of botany, and find that wild-flower botany is\n     more or less inexhaustible, but the cultivated flowers are infinite\n     in their caprice. The forget-me-nots and milkworts are singularly\n     beautiful here, but there is quite as much variety in English\n     fields as in these, as long as one does not climb much--and I'm\n     very lazy, compared to what I used to be,\"\n\n     \"_LAUTERBRUNNEN, 13th June, 1866._\n\n     \"We had a lovely evening here yesterday, and the children enjoyed\n     and understood it better than anything they have yet seen among the\n     Alps. Constance was in great glory in a little walk I took her in\n     the twilight through the upper meadows: the Staubbach seen only as\n     a grey veil suspended from its rock, and the great Alps pale above\n     on the dark sky. She condescended nevertheless to gather a great\n     bunch of the white catchfly,--to make 'pops' with,--her friend\n     Marie at the Giesbach having shown her how a startling detonation\n     may be obtained, by skilful management, out of its globular calyx.\n\n     \"This morning is not so promising,--one of the provoking ones which\n     will neither let you stay at home with resignation, nor go anywhere\n     with pleasure. I'm going to take the children for a little quiet\n     exploration of the Wengern path, to see how they like it, and if\n     the weather betters--we may go on. At all events I hope to find an\n     Alpine rose or two.\"\n\nIn June, 1866, the Professorship of Poetry at Oxford was vacant; and\nRuskin's friends were anxious to see him take the post. He, however,\nfelt no especial fitness or inclination for it, and did not stand. Three\nyears later he was elected to a Professorship that at this time had not\nbeen founded.\n\nAfter spending June in the Oberland, he went homewards through Berne,\nVevey and Geneva, to find his private secretary with a bundle of begging\nletters, and his friend Carlyle busy with the defence of Governor Eyre.\n\nIn 1865 an insurrection of negroes at Morant Bay, Jamaica, had\nthreatened to take the most serious shape, when it was stamped out by\nthe high-handed measures of Mr. Eyre. After the first congratulations\nwere over another side to the question called for a hearing. The Baptist\nmissionaries declared that among the negroes who were shot and hanged\n_in terrorem_ were peaceable subjects, respectable members of their own\nnative congregations, for whose character they could vouch; they added\nthat the gravity of the situation had been exaggerated by private enmity\nand jealousy of their work and creed. A strong committee was formed\nunder Liberal auspices, supported by such men as John Stuart Mill and\nThomas Hughes, the author of \"Tom Brown's Schooldays\"--men whose motive\nwas above suspicion--to bring Mr. Eyre to account.\n\nCarlyle, who admired the strong hand, and had no interest in Baptist\nmissionaries, accepted Mr. Eyre as the saviour of society in his West\nIndian sphere; and there were many, both in Jamaica and at home, who\nbelieved that, but for his prompt action, the white population would\nhave been massacred with all the horrors of a savage rebellion. Ruskin\nhad been for many years the ally of the Broad Church and Liberal party.\nBut he was now coming more and more under the personal influence of\nCarlyle; and when it came to the point of choosing sides, declared\nhimself, in a letter to the _Daily Telegraph_ (December 20th, 1865), a\nConservative and a supporter of order; and joined the Eyre Defence\nCommittee with a subscription of \u00a3100. The prominent part he took, for\nexample, in the meeting of September, 1866, was no doubt forced upon him\nby his desire to save Carlyle, whose recent loss and shaken nerves made\nsuch business especially trying to him. Letters of this period remain,\nin which Carlyle begs Ruskin to \"be diligent, I bid you!\"--and so on,\nadding, \"I must absolutely _shut up_ in that direction, to save my\nsanity.\" And so it fell to the younger man to work through piles of\npamphlets and newspaper correspondence, to interview politicians and men\nof business, and--what was so very foreign to his habits--to take a\nleading share in a party agitation.\n\nBut in all this he was true to his Jacobite instincts. He had been\nbrought up a Tory; and though he had drifted into an alliance with the\nBroad Church and philosophical Liberals, he was never one of them. Now\nthat his father was gone, perhaps he felt a sort of duty to own himself\nhis father's son; and the failure of liberal philanthropy to realise his\nideals, and of liberal philosophy to rise to his economic standards,\ncombined with Carlyle to induce him to label himself Conservative. But\nhis conservatism could not be accepted by the party so called.\nFortunately, he did not need or ask their recognition. He took no\ninterest in party politics, and never in his life voted at a\nParliamentary election. He only meant to state in the shortest terms\nthat he stood for loyalty and order.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n\"TIME AND TIDE\" (1867)\n\n\nThe series of letters published as \"Time and Tide by Weare and Tyne\"\nwere addressed[13] to Thomas Dixon, a working cork-cutter of Sunderland,\nwhose portrait by Professor Legros is familiar to visitors at the South\nKensington Museum. He was one of those thoughtful, self-educated working\nmen in whom, as a class, Ruskin had been taking a deep interest for the\npast twelve years, an interest which had purchased him a practical\ninsight into their various capacities and aims, and the right to speak\nwithout fear or favour. At this time there was an agitation for\nParliamentary reform, and the better representation of the working\nclasses; and it was on this topic that the letters were begun, though\nthe writer went on to criticise the various social ideals then popular,\nand to propose his own. He had already done something of the sort in\n\"Unto this Last\"; but \"Time and Tide\" is much more complete, and the\nresult of seven years' further thought and experience. His \"Fors\nClavigera\" is a continuation of these letters, but written at a time\nwhen other work and ill health broke in upon his strength. \"Time and\nTide\" is not only the statement of his social scheme as he saw it in his\ncentral period, but, written as these letters were--at a stroke, so to\nspeak--condensed in exposition and simple in language, they deserve the\nmost careful reading by the student of Ruskin.\n\n[Footnote 13: During February, March and April, 1867, and published in\nthe _Manchester Examiner_ and _Leeds Mercury_.]\n\nBefore this work was ended, Carlyle had come back from Mentone to\nChelsea, and was begging his friend, in the warmest terms, to come and\nsee him. Shortly afterward, a passage which Ruskin would not retract\ngave offence to Carlyle. But the difference was healed, and later years\nreveal the sage of Chelsea as kindly and affectionate as ever. This\nfriendship between the two greatest writers of their age, between two\nmen of vigorous individuality, outspoken opinions, and widely different\ntastes and sympathies, is a fine episode in the history of both.\n\nIn May, Ruskin was invited to Cambridge to receive the honorary degree\nof LL.D., and to deliver the Rede Lecture. The _Cambridge Chronicle_ of\nMay 24th, 1867, says: \"The body of the Senate House was quite filled\nwith M.A.'s and ladies, principally the latter, whilst there was a large\nattendance of undergraduates in the galleries, who gave the lecturer a\nmost enthusiastic reception.\" A brief report of the lecture was printed\nin the newspaper; but it was not otherwise published, and the manuscript\nseems to have been mislaid for thirty years. I take the liberty of\ncopying the opening sentences as a specimen of that Academical oratory\nwhich Mr. Ruskin then adopted, and used habitually in his earlier\nlectures at Oxford.\n\nThe title of the discourse was \"The Relation of National Ethics to\nNational Arts.\"\n\n\n     \"In entering on the duty to-day entrusted to me, I should hold it\n     little respectful to my audience if I disturbed them by expression\n     of the diffidence which they know that I must feel in first\n     speaking in this Senate House; diffidence which might well have\n     prevented me from accepting such duty, but ought not to interfere\n     with my endeavour simply to fulfil it. Nevertheless, lest the\n     direction which I have been led to give to my discourse, and the\n     narrow limits within which I am compelled to confine the treatment\n     of its subject may seem in anywise inconsistent with the purpose of\n     the founder of this Lecture--or with the expectations of those by\n     whose authority I am appointed to deliver it, let me at once say\n     that I obeyed their command, not thinking myself able to teach any\n     dogma in the philosophy of the arts, which could be of any new\n     interest to the members of this University: but only that I might\n     obtain the sanction of their audience, for the enforcement upon\n     other minds of the truth, which--after thirty years spent in the\n     study of art, not dishonestly, however feebly--is manifest to me as\n     the clearest of all that I have learned, and urged upon me as the\n     most vital of all I have to declare.\"\n\nHe then distinguished between true and false art, the true depending\nupon sincerity, whether in literature, music or the formative arts: he\nreinforced his old doctrine of the dignity of true imagination as the\nattribute of healthy and earnest minds; and energetically attacked the\ncommercial art-world of the day, and the notion that drawing-schools\nwere to be supported for the sake of the gain they would bring to our\nmanufacturers.\n\nIn this lecture we see the germ of the ideas, as well as the beginning\nof the style, of the Oxford Inaugural course, and the \"Eagle's Nest\";\nsomething quite different in type from the style and teaching of the\naddresses to working men, or to mixed popular audiences at Edinburgh or\nManchester, or even at the Royal Institution. At this latter place, on\nJune 4th, Sir Henry Holland in the chair, he lectured on \"The Present\nState of Modern Art, with reference to advisable arrangement of the\nNational Gallery,\" repeating much of what he had said in \"Time and Tide\"\nabout the taste for the horrible and absence of true feeling for pure\nand dignified art in the theatrical shows of the day, and in the\nadmiration for Gustave Dor\u00e9, then a new fashion. Mr. Ruskin could never\nendure that the man who had illustrated Balzac's \"Contes Dr\u00f4latiques\"\nshould be chosen by the religious public of England as the exponent of\ntheir sacred ideals.\n\nIn July after a short visit to Huntly Burn near Abbotsford, he went to\nKeswick for a few weeks, from whence he wrote the rhymed letters to his\ncousin at home, quoted (with the date wrongly given as 1857) in\n\"Pr\u00e6terita\" to illustrate his \"heraldic character\" of \"Little Pigs\" and\nto shock exoteric admirers. Like, for example, Rossetti and Carlyle,\nRuskin was fond of playful nicknames and grotesque terms of endearment.\nHe never stood upon his dignity with intimates; and was ready to allow\nthe liberties he took, much to the surprise of strangers.\n\nHe reached Keswick by July 4, and spent his time chiefly in walks upon\nthe hills, staying at the Derwentwater Hotel. He wrote:\n\n\n     \"Keswick, _19th July, '67, Afternoon, 1/2 past 3_.\n\n     \"My dearest Mother,\n\n     \"As this is the last post before Sunday I send one more line to say\n     I've had a delightful forenoon's walk--since 1/2 past ten--by St.\n     John's Vale, and had pleasant thoughts, and found one of the most\n     variedly beautiful torrent beds I ever saw in my life; and I feel\n     that I gain strength, slowly but certainly, every day. The great\n     good of the place is that I can be content without going on great\n     excursions which fatigue and do me harm (or else worry me with\n     problems;)--I am _content_ here with the roadside hedges and\n     streams; and this contentment is the great thing for health,--and\n     there is hardly anything to annoy me of absurd or calamitous human\n     doing; but still this ancient cottage life--very rude and miserable\n     enough in its torpor--but clean, and calm, not a vile cholera and\n     plague of bestirred pollution, like back streets in London. There\n     is also much more real and deep beauty than I expected to find, in\n     some of the minor pieces of scenery, and in the cloud effects.\"\n\n     \"_July 16_.\n\n     \"I have the secret of extracting sadness from all things, instead\n     of joy, which is no enviable talisman. Forgive me if I ever write\n     in a way that may pain you. It is best that you should know, when I\n     write cheerfully, it is no pretended cheerfulness; so when I am\n     sad--I think it right to confess it.\"\n\n     \"_30th July._\n\n     \"Downes[14] arrived yesterday quite comfortably and in fine\n     weather. It is not bad this morning, and I hope to take him for a\n     walk up Saddleback, which, after all, is the finest, to my mind, of\n     all the Cumberland hills--though that is not saying much; for they\n     are much lower in effect, in proportion to their real height, than\n     I had expected. The beauty of the country is in its quiet roadside\n     bits, and rusticity of cottage life and shepherd labour. Its\n     mountains are sorrowfully melted away from my old dreams of them.\"\n\n     [Footnote 14: The gardener at Denmark Hill.]\n\n     Next day he \"went straight up the steep front of Saddleback by the\n     central ridge to the summit. It is the finest thing I've yet seen,\n     there being several bits of real crag-work, and a fine view at the\n     top over the great plains of Penrith on one side, and the\n     Cumberland hills, as a chain, on the other. Fine fresh wind\n     blowing, and plenty of crows. Do you remember poor papa's favourite\n     story about the Quaker whom the crows ate on Saddleback? There were\n     some of the biggest and hoarsest-voiced ones about the cliff that\n     I've ever had sympathetic croaks from;--and one on the top, or near\n     it, so big that Downes and Crawley, having Austrian tendencies in\n     politics, took it for a 'black eagle.' Downes went up capitally,\n     though I couldn't get him down again, because he _would_ stop to\n     gather ferns. However, we did it all and came down to Threlkeld--of\n     the Bridal of Triermain,\n\n    \"'The King his way pursued\n    By lonely Threlkeld's waste and wood,'\n\n     \"in good time for me to dress and, for a wonder, go out to dinner\n     with Acland's friends the Butlers.\"\n\n     As an episode in this visit to Keswick, ten days were given to the\n     neighbourhood of Ambleside, \"to show Downes Windermere.\"\n\n     \"Waterhead, Windermere,\n\n     \"_10th August, 1867, Evening_.\n\n     \"I was at Coniston to-day. Our old Waterhead Inn, where I was so\n     happy playing in the boats, _exists_ no more.--Its place is grown\n     over with smooth Park grass--the very site of it forgotten! and, a\n     quarter of a mile down the lake, a vast hotel built in the railroad\n     station style--making up, I suppose, its fifty or eighty beds, with\n     coffee-room--smoking-room--and every pestilent and devilish\n     Yankeeism that money can buy, or speculation plan.\n\n     \"The depression, whatever its cause, does not affect my strength. I\n     walked up a long hill on the road to Coniston to-day (gathering\n     wild raspberries)--then from this new Inn, two miles to the foot of\n     Coniston Old Man; up it; down again--(necessarily!)--and back to\n     dinner, without so much as warming myself--not that there was much\n     danger of doing that at the top; for a keen west wind was blowing\n     drifts of cloud by at a great pace, and one was glad of the\n     shelter of the pile of stones, the largest and _oldest_ I ever saw\n     on a mountain top. I suppose the whole mountain is named from it.\n     It is of the shape of a beehive, strongly built, about 15 feet high\n     (so that I made Downes follow me up it before I would allow he had\n     been at the top of the Old Man) and covered with lichen and short\n     moss. Lancaster sands and the Irish sea were very beautiful, and so\n     also the two lakes of Coniston and Windermere, lying in the vastest\n     space of sweet cultivated country I have ever looked over,--a great\n     part of the view from the Rigi being merely over black pine forest,\n     even on the plains. Well, after dinner, the evening was very\n     beautiful, and I walked up the long hill on the road back from\n     Coniston--and kept ahead of the carriage for two miles: I was sadly\n     vexed when I had to get in: and now--I don't feel as if I had been\n     walking at all--and shall probably lie awake for an hour or\n     two--and feeling as if I had not had exercise enough to send me to\n     sleep.\"\n\n\n     \"LANGDALE, _13th August, Evening._\n\n     \"It is perfectly calm to-night, not painfully hot--and the full\n     moon shining over the mountains, opposite my window, which are the\n     scene of Wordsworth's 'Excursion.' It was terribly hot in the\n     earlier day, and I did not leave the house till five o'clock. Then\n     I went out, and in the heart of Langdale Pikes found the loveliest\n     rock-scenery, chased with silver waterfalls, that I ever set foot\n     or heart upon. The Swiss torrent-beds are always more or less\n     savage, and ruinous, with a terrible sense of overpowering strength\n     and danger, lulled. But here, the sweet heather and ferns and star\n     mosses nestled in close to the dashing of the narrow\n     streams;--while every cranny of crag held its own little placid\n     lake of amber, trembling with falling drops--but quietly\n     trembling--not troubled into ridgy wave or foam--the rocks\n     themselves, _ideal_ rock, as hard as iron--no--not quite that, but\n     _so_ hard that after breaking some of it, breaking solid white\n     quartz seemed like smashing brittle loaf sugar, in comparison--and\n     cloven into the most noble masses; not grotesque, but majestic and\n     full of harmony with the larger mountain mass of which they formed\n     a part. Fancy what a place! for a hot afternoon after five, with no\n     wind--and absolute solitude; no creature--except a lamb or two--to\n     mix any ruder sound or voice with the plash of the innumerable\n     streamlets.\"\n\nIt was during this tour that he looked at a site on the hill above\nBowness-on-Windermere, where Mr. T. Richmond, the owner, proposed\nbuilding him a house. He liked the view, but found it too near the\nrailway station.\n\nAfter spending September with his mother at Norwood under the care of\nDr. Powell, he was able to return home, prepare \"Time and Tide\" for\npublication, and write the preface on Dec. 14th. On the 19th the book\nwas out, and immediately bought up. A month later the second edition was\nissued.\n\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nAGATES, AND ABBEVILLE (1868)\n\n\nOf less interest to the general reader, though too important a part of\nRuskin's life and work to be passed over without mention, are his\nstudies in Mineralogy. We have heard of his early interest in spars and\nores; of his juvenile dictionary in forgotten hieroglyphics; and of his\nstudies in the field and at the British Museum. He had made a splendid\ncollection, and knew the various museums of Europe as familiarly as he\nknew the picture-galleries. In the \"Ethics of the Dust\" he had chosen\nCrystallography as the subject in which to exemplify his method of\neducation; and in 1867, after finishing the letters to Thomas Dixon, he\ntook refuge, as before, among the stones, from the stress of more\nagitating problems.\n\nIn the lecture on the Savoy Alps in 1863 he had referred to a hint of\nSaussure's that the contorted beds of the limestones might possibly be\ndue to some sort of internal action, resembling on a large scale that\nseparation into concentric or curved bands which is seen in calcareous\ndeposits. The contortions of gneiss were similarly analogous, it was\nsuggested, to those of the various forms of silica. Ruskin did not adopt\nthe theory, but put it by for examination in contrast with the usual\nexplanation of these phenomena, as the simple mechanical thrust of the\ncontracting surface of the earth.\n\nIn 1863 and 1866 he had been among the Nagelfl\u00fch of Northern\nSwitzerland, studying the puddingstones and breccias. He saw that the\ndifference between these formations, in their structural aspect, and the\nhand-specimens in his collection of pisolitic and brecciated minerals\nwas chiefly a matter of size; and that the resemblances in form were\nvery close. And so he concluded that if the structure of the minerals\ncould be fully understood a clue might be found to the very puzzling\nquestion of the origin of mountain structure.\n\nHence his attempt to analyze the structure of agates and similar banded\nand brecciated minerals, in the series of papers in the _Geological\nMagazine_;[15] an attempt which though it was never properly completed,\nand fails to come to any general conclusion, is extremely interesting as\nan account of beautiful and curious natural forms till then little\nnoticed by mineralogists.\n\n[Footnote 15: August and November, 1867, January, April and May, 1868,\nDecember, 1869, and January, 1870, illustrated with very fine mezzotint\nplates and woodcuts.]\n\nA characteristic anecdote of this period is preserved in \"Arrows of the\nChace.\"\n\n\"The _Daily Telegraph_ of January 21st, 1868, contained a leading\narticle upon the following facts. It appeared that a girl, named Matilda\nGriggs, had been nearly murdered by her seducer, who, after stabbing her\nin no less than thirteen places, had then left her for dead. She had,\nhowever, still strength enough to crawl into a field close by, and there\nswooned. The assistance she met with in this plight was of a rare kind.\nTwo calves came up to her, and disposing themselves on either side of\nher bleeding body, thus kept her warm and partly sheltered from cold\nand rain. Temporarily preserved, the girl eventually recovered, and\nentered into recognizances, under a sum of forty pounds, to prosecute\nher murderous lover. But 'she loved much,' and failing to prosecute,\nforfeited her recognizances, and was imprisoned by the Chancellor of the\nExchequer for her debt. 'Pity the poor debtor,' wrote the _Daily\nTelegraph_, and in the next day's issue appeared the following letter,\nprobably not intended for the publication accorded to it. 'Sir,--Except\nin 'Gil Blas,' I never read of anything Astr\u00e6an on the earth so perfect\nas the story in your fourth article to-day. I send you a cheque for the\nChancellor. If forty, in legal terms, means four hundred, you must\nexplain the farther requirements to your impulsive public.\n\n\"'I am, Sir, your faithful servant, 'J. RUSKIN.'\"\n\nThe writer of letters like this naturally had a large correspondence,\nbeside that which a circle of private friends and numberless admirers\nand readers elicited. About this time it grew to such a pitch that he\nwas obliged to print a form excusing him from letter-writing on the\nground of stress of work. And indeed, this year, though he did not\npublish his annual volume, as usual, he was fully occupied with frequent\nletters to newspapers, several lectures and addresses, a preface to the\nreprint of his old friend Cruikshank's \"Grimm,\" and the beginning of a\nnew botanical work, \"Proserpina,\" in addition to the mineralogy, and a\nrenewed interest in classical studies. Of the public addresses the most\nimportant was that on \"The Mystery of Life and its Arts,\" delivered in\nthe theatre of the Royal College of Science, Dublin (May 13th), and\nprinted in \"Sesame and Lilies.\"\n\nAfter this visit to Ireland he spent a few days at Winnington; and late\nin August crossed the Channel, for rest and change at Abbeville. For the\npast five years he had found too little time for drawing; it was twenty\nyears since his last sketching of French Gothic, except for a study (now\nat Oxford), of the porch at Amiens, in 1856. He took up the old work\nwhere he had left it, after writing the \"Seven Lamps,\" with fresh\ninterest and more advanced powers of draughtsmanship as shown in the\npencil study of the Place Amiral Courbet, now in the drawing school at\nOxford.\n\nThe following are extracts from the usual budget of home letters;\nreaders of \"Fors\" will need no further introduction to their old\nacquaintance, the tallow-chandler.\n\n\n     \"ABBEVILLE, _Friday, 18th Sept._, 1868\n\n     \"You seem to have a most uncomfortable time of it, with the\n     disturbance of the house. However, I can only leave you to manage\n     these things as you think best--or feel pleasantest to yourself. I\n     am saddened by another kind of disorder, France is in everything so\n     fallen back, so desolate and comfortless, compared to what it was\n     twenty years ago--the people so much rougher, clumsier, more\n     uncivil--everything they do, vulgar and base. Remnants of the old\n     nature come out when they begin to know you. I am drawing at a nice\n     tallow-chandler's door, and to-day, for the first time had to go\n     inside for rain. He was very courteous and nice, and warned me\n     against running against the candle-ends--or bottoms, as they were\n     piled on the shelves, saying--'You must take care, you see, not to\n     steal any of my candles'--or 'steal _from_ my candles,' meaning not\n     to rub them off on my coat. He has a beautiful family of cats--papa\n     and mamma and two superb kittens--half Angora.\"\n\n     \"_22nd Sept._\n\n     \"I am going to my cats and tallow-chandler.... I was very much\n     struck by the superiority of manner both in him and in his two\n     daughters who serve at the counter, to persons of the same class in\n     England. When the girls have weighed out their candles, or written\n     down the orders that are sent in, they instantly sit down to their\n     needlework behind the counter, and are always busy, yet always\n     quiet; and their father, though of course there may be vulgar\n     idioms in his language which I do not recognize, has entirely the\n     manners of a gentleman.\"\n\n     _30th Sept_.\n\n     \"I have the advantage here I had not counted on. I see by the\n     papers that the weather in England is very stormy and bad. Now,\n     though it is showery here, and breezy, it has always allowed me at\n     some time of the day to draw. The air is tender and soft,\n     invariably--even when blowing with force; and to-day, I have seen\n     quite the loveliest sunset I ever yet saw,--one at Boulogne in '61\n     was richer; but for delicacy and loveliness nothing of past sight\n     ever came near this.\"\n\nEarlier on the same day he had written:\n\n\n     \"I am well satisfied with the work I am doing, and even with my own\n     power of doing it, if only I can keep myself from avariciously\n     trying to do too much, and working hurriedly. But I can do _very_\n     little quite _well_, each day: with that however it is my bounden\n     duty to be content.\n\n     \"And now I have a little piece of news for you. Our old Herne Hill\n     house being now tenantless, and requiring some repairs before I can\n     get a tenant, I have resolved to keep it for myself, for my rougher\n     mineral work and mass of collection; keeping only my finest\n     specimens at Denmark Hill. My first reason for this, is affection\n     for the old house:--my second, want of room;--my third, the\n     incompatibility of hammering, washing, and experimenting on stones\n     with cleanliness in my stores of drawings. And my fourth is the\n     power I shall have, when I want to do anything very quietly, of\n     going up the hill and thinking it out in the old garden, where your\n     greenhouse still stands, and the aviary--without fear of\n     interruption from callers.\n\n     \"It may perhaps amuse you, in hours which otherwise would be\n     listless, to think over what may be done with the old house. I have\n     ordered it at once to be put in proper repair by Mr. Snell; but for\n     the furnishing, I can give no directions at present: it is to be\n     very simple, at all events, and calculated chiefly for museum work\n     and for stores of stones and books: and you really must not set\n     your heart on having it furnished like Buckingham Palace.\n\n     \"I have bought to-day, for five pounds, the front of the porch of\n     the Church of St. James. It was going to be entirely destroyed. It\n     is worn away, and has little of its old beauty; but as a remnant of\n     the Gothic of Abbeville--as I happen to be here--and as the church\n     was dedicated to my father's patron saint (as distinct from mine)\n     I'm glad to have got it. It is a low arch--with tracery and\n     niches, which ivy, and the Erba della Madonna, will grow over\n     beautifully, wherever I rebuild it.\"\n\nAt Abbeville he had with him as usual his valet Crawley; and as before\nhe sent for Downes the gardener, to give him a holiday, and to enjoy his\nraptures over every new sight. C.E. Norton came on a short visit, and\nRuskin followed him to Paris, where he met the poet Longfellow (October\n7). At last on Monday, 19th October, he wrote:\n\n\n     \"Only a line to-day, for I am getting things together, and am a\n     little tired, but very well, and glad to come home, though much\n     mortified at having failed in half my plans, and done nothing\n     compared to what I expected. But it is better than if I were\n     displeased with all I _had_ done. It isn't Turner--and it isn't\n     Correggio--it isn't even Prout--but it isn't bad.\"\n\nReturning home, he gave an account of his autumn's work in the lecture\nat the Royal Institution, January 29th, 1869, on the \"Flamboyant\nArchitecture of the Valley of the Somme.\" This lecture was not then\npublished in full: but part of the original text is printed in the third\nchapter of the work we have next to notice, \"The Queen of the Air.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\n\"THE QUEEN OF THE AIR\" (1869)\n\n\nIn spite of a \"classical education\" and the influence of Aristotle upon\nthe immature art-theories of his earlier works, Ruskin was known, in his\nyounger days, as a Goth, and the enemy of the Greeks. When he began\nlife, his sense of justice made him take the side of Modern Painters\nagainst classical tradition. Later on, when considering the great\nquestions of education and the aims of life, he entirely set aside the\ncommon routine of Greek and Latin grammar as the all-in-all of culture.\nBut this was not because he shared Carlyle's contempt for classical\nstudies.\n\nIn \"Modern Painters,\" Vol. III., he had followed out the indications of\nnature-worship, and tried to analyse in general terms the attitude of\nthe Greek spirit towards landscape scenery, as betrayed in Homer and\nAristophanes and the poets usually read. Since that time his interest in\nGreek literature had been gradually increasing. He had made efforts to\nimprove his knowledge of the language; and he had spent many days in\nsketching and studying the terra-cottas and vases and coins at the\nBritish Museum. He had also taken up some study of Egyptology, through\nChampollion, Bunsen and Birch, in the hope of tracing the origin of\nGreek decorative art. Comparative mythology, at that time, was a\ndepartment of philology, introduced to the English public chiefly by Max\nM\u00fcller. Under his influence Ruskin entered step by step upon an inquiry\nwhich afterwards became of singular importance in his life and thought.\n\nIn 1865 he had told his hearers at Bradford that Greek Religion was not,\nas commonly supposed, the worship of Beauty, but of Wisdom and Power.\nThey did not, in their great age, worship \"Venus,\" but Apollo and\nAthena. And he regarded their mythology as a sincere tradition,\neffective in forming a high moral type, and a great school of art. In\nthe \"Ethics of the Dust\" he had explained the myth of Athena as parallel\nto that of Neith in Egypt; and in his fable of Neith and St. Barbara he\nhad hinted at a comparison, on equal terms, of Ancient and Medi\u00e6val\nmythology. He ended by saying that, though he would not have his young\nhearers believe \"that the Greeks were better than we, and that their\ngods were real angels,\" yet their art and morals were in some respects\ngreater, and their beliefs were worth respectful and sympathetic study.\nThe \"Queen of the Air\" is his contribution to this study.\n\nOn March 9th, 1869, his lecture at University College, London, on \"Greek\nMyths of Cloud and Storm,\" began with an attempt to explain in popular\nterms how a myth differs from mere fiction on the one hand and from\nallegory on the other, being \"not conceived didactically, but didactic\nin its essence, as all good art is.\" He showed that Greek poetry dealt\nwith the series of Nature-myths with which were interwoven ethical\nsuggestions; that these were connected with Egyptian beliefs, but that\nthe full force of them was only developed in the central period of Greek\nhistory, and their interpretation was to be read in a sympathetic\nanalysis of the spirit of men like Pindar and \u00c6schylus. \"The great\nquestion,\" he said, \"in reading a story is, always, not what wild hunter\ndreamed, or what childish race first dreaded it; but what wise man first\nperfectly told, and what strong people first perfectly lived by it. And\nthe real meaning of any myth is that which it has at the noblest age of\nthe nation among whom it was current.\"\n\nIn the next chapter he worked out, as a sequel to his lecture, two\ngroups of Animal-myths; those connected with birds, and especially the\ndove, as type of Spirit, and those connected with the serpent in its\nvarious significances. These two studies were continued, more or less,\nin \"Love's Meinie\" and in the lecture printed in \"Deucalion,\" as the\nthird group, that of Plant-myths, was carried on in \"Proserpina.\" The\nvolume contained also extracts from the lecture on the Architecture of\nthe Valley of the Somme, and two numbers of the \"Cestus of Aglaia,\" and\nclosed with a paper on The Hercules of Camarina, read to the South\nLambeth Art School on March 15th. This study of a Greek coin had already\nformed the subject of an address at the Working Men's College, and\nanticipated the second course of Oxford Lectures. For the rest, \"The\nQueen of the Air\" is marked by its statement, more clearly than before\nin Ruskin's writing, of the dependence of moral upon physical life, and\nof physical upon moral science. He speaks with respect of the work of\nDarwin and Tyndall; but as formerly in the Rede Lecture, and afterwards\nin the \"Eagle's Nest,\" he claims that natural science should not be\npursued as an end in itself, paramount to all other conclusions and\nconsiderations; but as a department of study subordinate to ethics, with\na view to utility and instruction.\n\nBefore this book was quite ready for publication, and after a sale of\nsome of his less treasured pictures at Christie's he left home for a\njourney to Italy, to revisit the subjects of \"Stones of Venice,\" as in\n1868 he had revisited those of the \"Seven Lamps.\" At Vevey, on the way,\nhe wrote his preface (May 1st).\n\nBy quiet stages he passed the Simplon, writing from Domo d'Ossola, 5th\nMay, 1869:\n\n\n     \"I never yet had so beautiful a day for the Simplon as this has\n     been; though the skin of my face is burning now all over--to keep\n     me well in mind of its sunshine. I left Brieg at 6 exactly--light\n     clouds breaking away into perfect calm of blue. Heavy snow on the\n     col--about a league--with the wreaths in many places higher than\n     the carriage. Then, white crocus all over the fields, with\n     Soldanelle and Primula farinosa. I walked about three miles up, and\n     seven down, with great contentment; the waterfalls being all in\n     rainbows, and one beyond anything I ever yet saw; for it fell in a\n     pillar of spray against shadow behind, and became rainbow\n     altogether. I was just near enough to get the belt broad, and the\n     down part of the arch: and the whole fall became orange and violet\n     against deep shade. To-morrow I hope to get news of you all, at\n     Baveno.\"\n\n     \"BAVENO, _Thursday, 6th May_, 1869.\n\n     \"It is wet this morning, and very dismal, for we are in a ghastly\n     new Inn, the old one being shut up; and there is always a re-action\n     after a strong excitement like the beauty of the Simplon yesterday,\n     which leaves one very dull. But it is of no use growling or mewing.\n     I hope to be at Milan to-morrow--at Verona for Sunday. I have been\n     reading Dean Swift's life, and 'Gulliver's Travels' again. Putting\n     the delight in dirt, which is a mere disease, aside, Swift is very\n     like me, in most things:--in opinions exactly the same.\"\n\nAt Milan, next day, he went to see the St. Catherine of Luini which he\nhad copied, and found it wantonly damaged by the carelessness of masons\nwho put their ladders up against it, just as if it were a bit of common\nwhitewashed wall.\n\nOn the 8th he reached Verona after seventeen years' absence, and on the\n10th he was in Venice. There, looking at the works of the old painters\nwith a fresh eye, and with feelings and thoughts far different from\nthose with which he had viewed them as a young man, in 1845, he saw\nbeauties he had passed over before, in the works of a painter till then\nlittle regarded by connoisseurs, and entirely neglected by the public.\nHistorians of art like Crowe and Cavalcaselle[16] had indeed examined\nCarpaccio's works and investigated his life, along with the lives and\nworks of many another obscure master: artists like Hook and Burne-Jones\nhad admired his pictures; Ruskin had mentioned his backgrounds twice or\nthrice in \"Stones of Venice.\" But no writer had noticed his\nextraordinary interest as an exponent of the mythology of the Middle\nAges, as the illustrator of poetical folk-lore derived from those\nantique myths of Greece, and newly presented by the genius of\nChristianity.\n\n[Footnote 16: Their \"History of Painting in North Italy,\" containing a\ndetailed account of Carpaccio, was published in 1871.]\n\nThis was a discovery for which Ruskin was now ripe, He saw at once that\nhe had found a treasure-house of things new and old. He fell in love\nwith St. Ursula as, twenty-four years earlier, he had fallen in love\nwith the statue of Ilaria at Lucca; and she became, as time after time\nhe revisited Venice for her sake, a personality, a spiritual presence, a\nliving ideal, exactly as the Queen of the Air might have been to the\nsincere Athenian in the pagan age of faith. The story of her life and\ndeath became an example, the conception of her character, as read in\nCarpaccio's picture, became a standard for his own life and action in\nmany a time of distress and discouragement. The thought of \"What would\nSt. Ursula say?\" led him--not always, but far more often than his\ncorrespondents knew--to burn the letter of sharp retort upon stupidity\nand impertinence, and to force the wearied brain and overstrung nerves\ninto patience and a kindly answer. And later on, the playful credence\nwhich he accorded to the myth deepened into a renewed sense of the\npossibility of spiritual realities, when he learnt to look, with those\nmedi\u00e6val believers; once more as a little child upon the unfathomable\nmysteries of life.\n\nBut this anticipates the story; at the time, he found in Carpaccio the\nman who had touched the full chord of his feelings and his thoughts,\njust as, in his boyhood, Turner had led him, marvelling, through the\nfire and cloud to the mountain-altar; and as, in his youth, Tintoret had\ninterpreted the storm and stress of a mind awakening to the terrible\nrealities of the world. It was no caprice of a changeful taste, nor love\nof startling paradox, that brought him to \"discover Carpaccio;\" it was\nthe logical sequence of his studies, and widening interests, and a view\nof art embracing far broader issues than the connoisseurship of \"Modern\nPainters,\" or the didacticism of \"Seven Lamps,\" or the historical\nresearch of \"Stones of Venice.\"\n\nSoon after the \"Queen of the Air\" was published Carlyle wrote:\n\n\n     \"Last week I got y'r 'Queen of the Air,' and read it. _Euge,\n     Ettge._ No such Book have I met with for long years past. The one\n     soul now in the world who seems to feel as I do on the highest\n     matters, and speaks _mir aus dem Herzen_, exactly what I wanted to\n     hear!-As to the natural history of those old myths I remained here\n     and there a little uncert'n; but as to the meanings you put into\n     them, never anywhere. All these things I not only 'agree' with, but\n     w'd use Thor's Hammer, if I had it, to enforce and put in action on\n     this rotten world. Well done, well done!--and pluck up a heart, and\n     continue ag'n and ag'n. And don't say 'most g't tho'ts are dressed\n     _in shrouds_': many, many are the Phoebus Apollo celestial arrows\n     you still have to shoot into the foul Pythons, and poisonous\n     abominable Megatheriums and Plesiosaurians that go staggering ab't,\n     large as cathedrals, in our sunk Epoch ag'n....\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nVERONA AND OXFORD (1869-1870)\n\n\nThe main object of this journey was, however, not to study mythology,\nbut to continue the revision of old estimates of architecture, and after\nseventeen years to look with a fresh eye at the subjects of \"Stones of\nVenice.\"\n\nThe churches and monuments of Verona had been less thoroughly studied\nthan those of Venice, and now they were threatened with imminent\nrestoration. On May 25th he wrote:--\"It is very strange that I have just\nbeen in time--after 17 years' delay--to get the remainder of what I\nwanted from the red tomb of which my old drawing hangs in the\npassage\"--(the Castelbarco monument). \"To-morrow they put up scaffolding\nto retouch, and I doubt not, spoil it for evermore.\" He succeeded in\ngetting a delay of ten days, to enable him to paint the tomb in its\noriginal state; but before he went home it \"had its new white cap on and\nlooked like a Venetian gentleman in a pantaloon's mask.\" He brought away\none of the actual stones of the old roof.\n\nOn June 3 he wrote:\n\n\n     \"I am getting on well with all my own work; and much pleased with\n     some that Mr. Bunney is doing for me; so that really I expect to\n     carry off a great deal of Verona.... The only mischief of the\n     place is its being too rich. Stones, flowers, mountains--all\n     equally asking one to look at them; a history to every foot of\n     ground, and a picture on every foot of wall; frescoes fading away\n     in the neglected streets--like the colours of the dolphin.\"\n\nAs assistants in this enterprise of recording the monuments of Venice\nand Verona, and of recording them more fully and in a more interesting\nway than by photography, he took with him Arthur Burgess and John\nBunney, his former pupils. Mr. Burgess was the subject of a memoir by\nRuskin in the _Century Guild Hobby Horse_ (April, 1887), appreciating\nhis talents and lamenting his loss. Mr. Bunney, who had travelled with\nRuskin in Switzerland in 1863, and had lately lived near Florence,\nthenceforward settled in Venice, where he died in 1882, after completing\nhis great work, the St. Mark's now in the Ruskin Museum at Sheffield. A\nmemoir of him by Mr. Wedderburn appeared in the catalogue of the Venice\nExhibition, at the Fine Art Society's Gallery in November, 1882.\n\nAt Venice Ruskin had met his old friend Rawdon Brown[17], and Count\nGiberto Borromeo, whom he visited at Milan on his way home, with deep\ninterest in the Luinis and in the authentic bust of St. Carlo; so\nclosely resembling Ruskin himself. Another noteworthy encounter is\nrecorded in a letter of May 4th.[18]\n\n[Footnote 17: Whose book on the English in Italy (from Venetian\ndocuments) was shortly to be published, with funds supplied by Ruskin.]\n\n[Footnote 18: This date ought to be \"June 4th,\" as Mr. E.T. Cook notices\n(Library Edn. XIX., p. liv.).]\n\n\"As I was drawing in the square this morning, in a lovely, quiet,\nItalian, light, there came up the poet Longfellow with his little\ndaughter--a girl of 12, or 13, with _springy_-curled flaxen\nhair,--curls, or waves, that wouldn't come out in damp, I mean. They\nstayed talking beside me some time. I don't think it was a very vain\nthought that came over me, that if a photograph could have been taken of\nthe beautiful square of Verona, in that soft light, with Longfellow and\nhis daughter talking to me at my work--some people both in England and\nAmerica would have liked copies of it.\"\n\nReaders of \"Fors\" will recognise an incident noted on the 18th of June.\n\n\"Yesterday, it being quite cool, I went for a walk; and as I came down\nfrom a rather quiet hillside, a mile or two out of town, I past a house\nwhere the women were at work spinning the silk off the cocoons. There\nwas a sort of whirring sound as in an English mill; but at intervals\nthey sang a long sweet chant, all together, lasting about two\nminutes--then pausing a minute and then beginning again. It was good and\ntender music, and the multitude of voices prevented any sense of\nfailure, so that it was very lovely and sweet, and like the things that\nI mean to try to bring to pass.\"\n\nFor he was already meditating on the thoughts that issued in the\nproposals of St. George's Guild, and the daily letters of this summer\nare full of allusions to a scheme for a great social movement, as well\nas to his plans for the control of Alpine torrents and the better\nirrigation of their valleys. On the 2nd of June he wrote:--\"I see more\nand more clearly every day my power of showing how the Alpine torrents\nmay be--not subdued--but 'educated.' A torrent is just like a human\ncreature. Left to gain full strength in wantonness and rage, no power\ncan any more redeem it: but watch the channels of every early impulse,\nand fence _them_, and your torrent becomes the gentlest and most\nblessing of servants.\"\n\nHis mother was anxious for him to come home, being persuaded that he was\noverworking himself in the continued heat which his letters reported.\nBut he was loath to leave Italy, in which, he said, his work for the\nfuture lay. He made two more visits to Venice, to draw some of the\nsculptured details, now quickly perishing, and to make studies of\nTintoret and Carpaccio. Among other friends who met him there was Mr.\nHolman Hunt, with whom he went round his favourite Scuola di San Rocco\n(1st July). Two days later he wrote:\n\n\n     \"You will never believe it; but I have actually been trying to\n     draw--a baby. _The_ baby which the priest is holding in the little\n     copy of Tintoret by Edward Jones which my father liked so much,\n     over the basin stand in his bedroom.[19] All the knowledge I have\n     gained in these 17 years only makes me more full of awe and wonder\n     at Tintoret. But it _is_ so sad--so sad;--no one to care for him\n     but me, and all going so fast to ruin. He has done that infant\n     Christ in about five minutes--and I worked for two hours in vain,\n     and could not tell _why_ in vain--the mystery of his touch is so\n     great.\"\n\n[Footnote 19: Mr. and Mrs Burne-Jones had been in Venice in June, 1862;\nthe artist, then young and comparatively unknown, with a commission to\ncopy for Ruskin.]\n\nFinal farewell was said to Verona on the 10th August, for the homeward\njourney by the St. Gothard, and Giessbach, where he found the young\nfriend of 1866 now near her end--and Thun, where he met Professor C.E.\nNorton. On the way he wrote:\n\n\n     \"Lugano, _Saturday, 14th August_, 1869.\n\n     \"My Dearest Mother,\n\n     \"Yesterday--exactly three months from the day on which I entered\n     Verona to begin work, I made a concluding sketch of the old\n     Broletto of Como, which I drew first for the 7 lamps[20]--I know\n     not how many years ago,--and left Italy, for this time--having been\n     entirely well and strong every day of my quarter of a year's\n     sojourn there.\n\n     [Footnote 20: \"Stones of Venice,\" Vol. I., plate 5.]\n\n     \"This morning, before breakfast, I was sitting for the first time\n     before Luini's Crucifixion: for all religious-art qualities the\n     greatest picture south of the Alps--or rather, in Europe.\n\n     \"And just after breakfast I got a telegram from my cousin George\n     announcing that I am Professor of Art--the first--at the University\n     of Oxford.\n\n     \"Which will give me as much power as I can well use--and would have\n     given pleasure to my poor father--and therefore to me--once.... It\n     will make no difference in my general plans, about travel, etc. I\n     shall think quietly of it as I drive up towards St. Gothard to-day.\n\n     \"Ever, my dearest mother, ever your loving son,\n\n     \"J. Ruskin.\"\n\nSix years earlier, while being examined before the Royal Academy\ncommission, he had been asked: \"Has it ever struck you that it would be\nadvantageous to art if there were at the universities professors of art\nwho might give lectures and give instruction to young men who might\ndesire to avail themselves of it, as you have lectures on geology and\nbotany?\" To which he had replied: \"Yes, assuredly. The want of interest\non the part of the upper classes in art has been very much at the bottom\nof the abuses which have crept into all systems of education connected\nwith it. If the upper classes could only be interested in it by being\nled into it when young, a great improvement might be looked for,\ntherefore I feel the expediency of such an addition to the education of\nour universities.\" His interest in the first phase of University\nExtension, and his gifts of Turners to Oxford and Cambridge, had shown\nthat he was ready to go out of his way to help in the cause he had\npromoted. His former works on art, and reputation as a critic, pointed\nto him as the best qualified man in the country for such a post. He had\nbeen asked by his Oxford friends, who were many and influential, to\nstand for the Professorship of Poetry, three years earlier. There was no\ndoubt that the election would be a popular one, and creditable to the\nUniversity. On the other hand, Ruskin as Professor would have a certain\nsanction for his teaching, he believed; the title and the salary of \u00a3358\na year were hardly an object to him; but the position, as accredited\nlecturer and authorised instructor of youth, opened up new vistas of\nusefulness, new worlds of work to conquer; and he accepted the\ninvitation. On August 10th he was elected Slade Professor.\n\nHe returned home by the end of August to prepare himself for his new\nduties. During the last period he had been giving, on an average, half\na dozen lectures a year, which amply filled his annual volume. Twelve\nlectures were required of the professor. Many another man would have\nread his twelve lectures and gone his way; but he was not going to work\nin that perfunctory manner. He undertook to revise his whole teaching;\nto write for his hearers a completely new series of treatises on art,\nbeginning with first principles and broad generalisations, and\nproceeding to the different departments of sculpture, engraving,\nlandscape-painting and so on; then taking up the history of art:--an\nencyclop\u00e6dic scheme. He took this Oxford work not as a substitute for\nother occupation, exonerating him from further claims upon his energy\nand time; nor as a bye-play that could be slurred. He tried to do it\nthoroughly, and to do it in addition to the various work already in\nhand, under which, as it was, he used to break down, yearly, after each\nclimax of effort.\n\nThis autumn and winter, with his first and most important course in\npreparation, he was still writing letters to the _Daily Telegraph_;\nbeing begged by Carlyle to come--\"the sight of your face will be a\ncomfort,\" says the poor old man--and undertaking lectures at the Royal\nArtillery Institution, Woolwich, and at the Royal Institution, London.\nThe Woolwich lecture, given on December 14th, was that added to later\neditions of the \"Crown of Wild Olive,\" under the title of \"The Future of\nEngland.\" The other, February 4th, 1870, on \"Verona and its Rivers,\"\ninvolved not only a lecture on art and history and contemporary\npolitical economy, but an exhibition of the drawings which he and his\nassistants had made during the preceding summer.\n\nFour days later he opened a new period in his career with his inaugural\nLecture in the Sheldonian Theatre at Oxford.\n\n\n\n\nBOOK IV\n\nPROFESSOR AND PROPHET (1870-1900)\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nFIRST OXFORD LECTURES (1870-1871)\n\n\nOn Tuesday, 8th February, 1870, the Slade Professor's lecture-room was\ncrowded to over-flowing with members of the University, old and young,\nand their friends, who flocked to hear, and to see, the author of\n\"Modern Painters.\" The place was densely packed long before the time;\nthe ante-rooms were filled with personal friends, hoping for some corner\nto be found them at the eleventh hour; the doors were blocked open, and\nbesieged outside by a disappointed multitude.\n\nProfessorial lectures are not usually matters of great excitement: it\ndoes not often happen that the accommodation is found inadequate. After\nsome hasty arrangements Sir Henry Acland pushed his way to the table,\nannounced that it was impossible for the lecture to be held in that\nplace, and begged the audience to adjourn to the Sheldonian Theatre. At\nlast, welcomed by all Oxford, the Slade Professor appeared, to deliver\nhis inaugural address.[21]\n\n[Footnote 21: The inaugural course was given Feb. 8, 16, 23; March 3, 9,\n16 and 23, 1870.]\n\nIt was not strictly academic, the way he used to come in, with a little\nfollowing of familiars and assistants,--exchange recognition with\nfriends in the audience, arrange the objects he had brought to\nshow,--fling off his long sleeved Master's gown, and plunge into his\ndiscourse. His manner of delivery had not altered much since the time of\nthe Edinburgh Lectures. He used to begin by reading, in his curious\nintonation, the carefully-written passages of rhetoric, which usually\noccupied only about the half of his hour. By-and-by he would break off,\nand with quite another air extemporise the liveliest interpolations,\ndescribing his diagrams or specimens, restating his arguments,\nre-enforcing his appeal. His voice, till then artificially cadenced,\nsuddenly became vivacious; his gestures, at first constrained, became\ndramatic. He used to act his subject, apparently without premeditated\nart, in the liveliest pantomime. He had no power of voice-mimicry, and\nnone of the ordinary gifts of the actor. A tall and slim figure, not yet\nshortened from its five feet ten or eleven by the habitual stoop, which\nten years later brought him down to less than middle height; a stiff,\nblue frock-coat; prominent, half-starched wristbands, and tall collars\nof the Gladstonian type; and the bright blue stock which every one knows\nfor his heraldic bearing: no rings or gewgaws, but a long thin gold\nchain to his watch:--plain old-English gentleman, neither fashionable\nbourgeois nor artistic mountebank.\n\nBut he gave himself over to his subject with such unreserved intensity\nof imaginative power, he felt so vividly and spoke so from the heart,\nthat he became whatever he talked about, never heeding his professorial\ndignity, and never doubting the sympathy of his audience. Lecturing on\nbirds, he strutted like the chough, made himself wings like the swallow;\nhe was for the moment a cat, when he explained (not \"in scorn\") that\nengraving was the \"art of scratch.\" If it had been an affectation of\ntheatric display, we \"emancipated school-boys,\" as the Master of\nUniversity used to call us, would have seen through it at once, and\nscorned him. But it was so evidently the expression of his intense\neagerness for his subject, so palpably true to his purpose, and he so\ncarried his hearers with him, that one saw in the grotesque of the\nperformance only the guarantee of sincerity.\n\nIf one wanted more proof of that, there was his face, still\nyoung-looking and beardless; made for expression, and sensitive to every\nchange of emotion. A long head, with enormous capacity of brain, veiled\nby thick wavy hair, not affectedly lengthy but as abundant as ever, and\ndarkened into a deep brown, without a trace of grey; and short, light\nwhiskers growing high over his cheeks. A forehead not on the model of\nthe heroic type, but as if the sculptor had heaped his clay in handfuls\nover the eyebrows, and then heaped more. A big nose, aquiline, and broad\nat the base, with great thoroughbred nostrils and the \"septum\" between\nthem thin and deeply depressed; and there was a turn down at the corners\nof the mouth, and a breadth of lower lip, that reminded one of his\nVerona griffin, half eagle, half lion; Scotch in original type, and\nsuggesting a side to his character not all milk and roses. And under\nshaggy eyebrows, ever so far behind, the fieriest blue eyes, that\nchanged with changing expression, from grave to gay, from lively to\nsevere; that riveted you, magnetised you, seemed to look through you and\nread your soul; and indeed, when they lighted on you, you felt you had a\nsoul of a sort. What they really saw is a mystery. Some who had not\npersuaded them to see as others see, maintained that they only saw what\nthey looked for; others, who had successfully deceived them, that they\nsaw nothing. No doubt they might be deceived; but I know now that they\noften took far shrewder measurements of men--I do not say of women--than\nanybody suspected.\n\nFor the Inaugural Course, he was, so to speak, on his best behaviour,\nguarding against too hasty expression of individuality. He read careful\norations, stating his maturest views on the general theory of art, in\npicked language, suited to the academic position. The little volume is\nnot discursive or entertaining, like \"Modern Painters,\" and contains no\npictures either with pen or pencil; but it is crammed full of thought,\nand of the results of thought.\n\nThe Slade Professor was also expected to organise and superintend the\nteaching of drawing; and his first words in the first lecture expressed\nthe hope that he would be able to introduce some serious study of Art\ninto the University, which, he thought, would be a step towards\nrealising some of his ideals of education. He had long felt that mere\ntalking about Art was a makeshift, and that no real insight could be got\ninto the subject without actual and practical dealing with it. He found\na South Kensington School in existence at Oxford, with an able master,\nMr. Alexander Macdonald; and though he did not entirely approve of the\nmethods in use, tried to make the best of the materials to his hand,\naccepting but enlarging the scope of the system. The South Kensington\nmethod had been devised for industrial designing, primarily; Ruskin's\ndesire was to get undergraduates to take up a wider subject, to\nfamiliarise themselves with the technical excellences of the great\nmasters, to study nature, and the different processes of art,--drawing,\npainting and some forms of decorative work, such as, in especial,\ngoldsmiths' work, out of which the Florentine school had sprung. He did\nnot wish to train artists, but, as before in the Working Men's College,\nto cultivate the habit of mind that looks at nature and life, not\nanalytically, as science does, but for the sake of external aspect and\nexpression. By these means he hoped to breed a race of judicious patrons\nand critics, the best service any man can render to the cause of art.\n\nAnd so he got together a mass of examples in addition to the Turners\nwhich he had already given to the University galleries. He placed in the\nschool a few pictures by Tintoret, some drawings by Rossetti, Holman\nHunt, and Burne-Jones, and a great number of fine casts and engravings.\nHe arranged a series of studies by himself and others, as \"copies,\"\nfitted, like the Turners in the National Gallery, with sliding frames\nin cabinets for convenient reference and removal. After spending most of\nhis first Lent Term in this work, he went home for a month to prepare a\ncatalogue, which was published the same year: the school not being\nfinally opened until October, 1871. During these first visits to Oxford\nhe was the guest of Sir Henry Acland; on April 29, 1871, Professor\nRuskin, already honorary student of Christ Church, was elected to an\nhonorary fellowship at Corpus, and enabled to occupy rooms, vacated by\nthe Rev. Henry Furneaux, who gave up his fellowship on marrying Mr.\nArthur Severn's twin-sister.[22]\n\n[Footnote 22: His rooms were in Fellows' buildings, No. 2 staircase,\nfirst floor right.]\n\nAfter this work well begun, he went abroad for a vacation tour with a\nparty of friends--as in 1866; Lady Trevelyan's sister, Mrs. Hilliard, to\nchaperone the same young ladies, and three servants with them. They\nstarted on April 27th; stayed awhile at Meurice's to see Paris; and at\nGeneva, to go up the Sal\u00e8ve, twice, in bitter black east wind. Then\nacross the Simplon to Milan. After a month at Venice and Verona, where\nhe recurred to his scheme against inundation, then ridiculed by _Punch_,\nbut afterwards taken up seriously by the Italians, they went to\nFlorence, and met Professor Norton. In the end of June they turned\nhomewards, by Pisa and Lucca, Milan and Como, and went to visit their\nfriend Marie of the Giessbach.\n\nAt the Giessbach they spent a fortnight, enjoying the July weather and\nglorious walks, in the middle of which war was suddenly declared between\nGermany and France. The summons of their German waiter to join his\nregiment brought the news home to them, as such personal examples do,\nmore than columns of newspaper print; and as hostilities were rapidly\nbeginning, Ruskin, with the gloomiest forebodings for the beautiful\ncountry he loved, took his party home straight across France, before the\nways should be closed.\n\nAugust was a month of feverish suspense to everybody; to no one more\nthan to Ruskin, who watched the progress of the armies while he worked\nday by day at the British Museum preparing lectures for next term.\nThis was the course on Greek relief-sculpture, published as \"Aratra\nPentelici.\"[23] It was a happy thought to illustrate his subject\nfrom coins, rather than from disputed and mutilated fragments;\nand he worked into it his revised theory of the origin of art--not\nSchiller's nor Herbert Spencer's, and yet akin to theirs of the\n\"Spieltrieb,\"--involving the notion of doll-play;--man as a child,\nre-creating himself, in a double sense; imitating the creation of the\nworld and really creating a sort of secondary life in his art, to play\nwith, or to worship. In the last lecture of the series (published\nseparately) the Professor compared--as the outcome of classic art in\nRenaissance times--Michelangelo and Tintoret, greatly to the\ndisadvantage of Michelangelo. This heresy against a popular creed served\nas text for some severe criticism; but as he said in a prefatory note to\nthe pamphlet, readers \"must observe that its business is only to point\nout what is to be blamed in Michael Angelo, and that it assumes the fact\nof his power to be generally known,\" and he referred to Mr. Tyrwhitt's\n\"Lectures on Christian Art\" for the opposite side of the question.\n\n[Footnote 23: Delivered Nov. 24, 26, Dec. 1, 3, 8 and 10, 1870.]\n\nMeanwhile the war was raging. Ruskin was asked by his friends to raise\nhis voice against the ravage of France; but he replied that it was\ninevitable. At last, in October, he read how Rosa Bonheur and Edouard\nFr\u00e8re had been permitted to pass through the German lines, and next day\ncame the news of the bombardment of Strasburg, with anticipations of the\ndestruction of the Cathedral, library, and picture galleries,\nforetelling, as it seemed, the more terrible and irreparable ruin of the\ntreasure-houses of art in Paris. His heart was with the French, and he\nbroke silence in the bitterness of his spirit, upbraiding their\ndisorder and showing how the German success was the victory of \"one of\nthe truest monarchies and schools of honour and obedience yet organised\nunder heaven.\" He hoped that Germany, now that she had shown her power,\nwould withdraw, and demand no indemnity. But that was too much to ask.\n\nBefore long Paris itself became the scene of action, and in January 1871\nwas besieged and bombarded. So much of Ruskin's work and affection had\nbeen given to French Gothic that he could not endure to think of his\nbeloved Sainte Chapelle as being actually under fire--to say nothing of\nthe horror of human suffering in a siege. He joined Cardinal (then\nArchbishop) Manning, Professor Huxley, Sir John Lubbock and James\nKnowles in forming a \"Paris Food Fund,\" which shortly united with the\nLord Mayor's committee for the general relief of the besieged. The day\nafter writing on the Sainte Chapelle he attended the meeting of the\nMansion House, and gave a subscription of \u00a350. He followed events\nanxiously through the storm of the Commune and its fearful ending,\nangered at the fratricide and anarchy which no Mansion House help could\navert or repair.\n\nIt was no time for talking on art, he felt: instead of the full course,\nhe could only manage three lectures on landscape, and these not so\ncompletely prepared as to make them ready for printing. Before Christmas\nhe had been once more to Woolwich, where Colonel Brackenbury invited him\nto address the cadets at the prize-giving of the Science and Art\nDepartment, December 13, 1870, in which the Rev. W. Kingsley, an old\nfriend of Ruskin's and of Turner's, was one of the masters. Two of the\nlectures of the \"Crown of Wild Olive\" had been given there, with more\nthan usual animation, and enthusiastically received by crowded and\ndistinguished audiences, among whom was Prince Arthur (the Duke of\nConnaught), then at the Royal Military Academy. This time it was the\n\"Story of Arachne,\" an address on education and aims in life; opening\nwith reminiscences of his own childhood, and pleasantly telling the\nGreek myths of the spider and the ant, with interpretations for the\ntimes.\n\nIn the three lectures on landscape, given January 20, February 9 and 23,\n1871, he dwelt on the necessity of human and historic interest in\nscenery; and compared Greek \"solidity and veracity\" with Gothic\n\"spirituality and mendacity,\" Greek chiaroscuro and tranquil activity\nwith Gothic colour and \"passionate rest.\" Botticelli's \"Nativity\" (now\nin the National Gallery) was then being shown at the Old Master's\nExhibition, and Ruskin took it, along with the works of Cima, as a type\nof one form of Greek Art.\n\nIn April, 1871, his cousin, Miss Agnew, who had been seven years at\nDenmark Hill, was married to Mr. Arthur Severn. Ruskin, who had added to\nhis other work the additional labour of \"Fors Clavigera,\" went for a\nsummer's change to Matlock. July opened with cold, dry, dark weather,\ndangerous for out-of-door sketching. One morning early--for he was\nalways an early riser--he took a chill while painting a spray of wild\nroses before breakfast (the drawing now in the Oxford Schools). He was\nalready overworked, and it ended in a severe attack of internal\ninflammation, which nearly cost him his life. He was a difficult patient\nto deal with. The local practitioner who attended him used to tell how\nhe refused remedies, and in the height of the disease asked what would\nbe _worst_ for him. He took it; and to everybody's surprise,\nrecovered.[24]\n\n[Footnote 24: Mrs. Arthur Severn, in a note on the proof, says: \"It was\na slice of cold roast beef he hungered for, at Matlock (to our horror,\nand dear Lady Mount Temple's, who were nursing him): there was none in\nthe hotel, and it was late at night; and Albert Goodwin went off to get\nsome, somewhere, or anywhere. All the hotels were closed; but at last,\nat an eating-house in Matlock Bath, he discovered some, and came back\ntriumphant with it, wrapped up in paper; and J.R. enjoyed his late\nsupper thoroughly; and though we all waited anxiously till the morning\nfor the result, it had done no harm! And when he was told pepper was bad\nfor him, he dredged it freely over his food in defiance! It was directly\nafter our return to Denmark Hill he got Linton's letter offering him\nthis place (Brantwood). There are, I believe, ten acres of moor\nbelonging to Brantwood.\" Mr. Albert Goodwin, R.W.S., the landscape\npainter, travelled, about this time, in Italy with Ruskin.]\n\nDuring the illness at Matlock his thoughts reverted to the old\n\"Iteriad\" times of forty years before, when he had travelled with his\nparents and cousin Mary from that same \"New Bath Hotel,\" where he was\nnow lying, to the Lakes; and again he wearied for \"the heights that look\nadown upon the dale. The crags are lone on Coniston.\" If he could only\nlie down there, he said, he should get well again.\n\nHe had not fully recovered before he heard that W.J. Linton, the poet\nand wood-engraver, wished to sell a house and land at the very place:\n\u00a31,500, and it could be his. Without question asked he bought it at\nonce; and as it would be impossible to lecture at Oxford so soon after\nhis illness, he set off, before the middle of September, with his\nfriends the Hilliards to visit his new possession. They found a\nrough-cast country cottage, old, damp, decayed; smoky chimneyed and\nrat-riddled; but \"five acres of rock and moor and streamlet; and,\" he\nwrote, \"I think the finest view I know in Cumberland or Lancashire, with\nthe sunset visible over the same.\"\n\nThe spot was not, even then, without its associations: Gerald Massey the\npoet, Linton, and his wife Mrs. Lynn Linton the novelist, Dr. G.W.\nKitchin (Dean of Durham) had lived and worked there, and Linton had\nadorned it outside with revolutionary mottoes--\"God and the people,\" and\nso on. It had been a favourite point of view of Wordsworth's; his \"seat\"\nwas pointed out in the grounds. Tennyson had lived for a while close by:\nhis \"seat,\" too, was on the hill above Lanehead.\n\nBut the cottage needed thorough repair, and that cost more than\nrebuilding, not to speak of the additions of later years, which have\nended by making it into a mansion surrounded by a hamlet. And there was\nthe furnishing; for Denmark Hill, where his mother lived, was still to\nbe headquarters. Ruskin gave carte-blanche to the London upholsterer\nwith whom he had been accustomed to deal; and such expensive articles\nwere sent that when he came down for a month next autumn, he reckoned\nthat, all included, his country cottage had cost him not less than\n\u00a34,000.\n\nBut he was not the man to spend on himself without sharing his wealth\nwith others. On November 22nd, Convocation accepted a gift from the\nSlade Professor of \u00a35,000 to endow a mastership of drawing at Oxford, in\naddition to the pictures and \"copies\" placed in the schools; he had set\nup a relative in business with \u00a315,000, which was unfortunately lost;\nand at Christmas he gave \u00a37,000, the tithe of his remaining capital, to\nthe St. George's Fund; of which more hereafter.\n\nOn November 23rd he was elected Lord Rector of St. Andrew's University,\nby 86 votes against 79 for Lord Lytton. After the election it was\ndiscovered that, by the Scottish Universities Act of 1858, no one\nholding a professorship at a British University was eligible. Professor\nRuskin was disqualified, and gave no address; and Lord Neaves was chosen\nin his place.\n\nMrs. Ruskin was now ninety years of age; her sight was nearly gone, but\nshe still retained her powers of mind, and ruled with severe kindliness\nher household and her son. Her old servant Anne had died in March. Anne\nhad nursed John Ruskin as a baby, and had lived with the family ever\nsince, devoted to them, and ready for any disagreeable task--\n\n\"So that she was never quite in her glory,\" \"Pr\u00e6terita\" says, \"unless\nsome of us were ill. She had also some parallel speciality for _saying_\ndisagreeable things, and might be relied upon to give the extremely\ndarkest view of any subject, before proceeding to ameliorative action\nupon it. And she had a very creditable and republican aversion to doing\nimmediately, or in set terms, as she was bid; so that when my mother and\nshe got old together, and my mother became very imperative and\nparticular about having her teacup set on one side of her little round\ntable, Anne would observantly and punctiliously put it always on the\nother: which caused my mother to state to me, every morning after\nbreakfast, gravely, that if ever a woman in this world was possessed by\nthe Devil, Anne was that woman.\"\n\nBut this gloomy Calvinism was tempered with a benevolence quite as\nuncommon. It was from his parents that Ruskin learned never to turn off\na servant, and the Denmark Hill household was as easy-going as the\nlegendary \"baronial\" retinue of the good old times. A young friend asked\nMrs. Ruskin, in a moment of indiscretion, what such a one of the ancient\nmaids did--for there were several without apparent occupation about the\nhouse. Mrs. Ruskin drew herself up and said, \"She, my dear, puts out the\ndessert.\"\n\nAnd yet, in her blindness, she could read character unhesitatingly. That\nwas, no doubt, why people feared her. When Mr. Secretary Howell, in the\ndays when he was still the oracle of the Ruskin-Rossetti circle, had\nbeen regaling them with his wonderful tales, after dinner, she would\nthrow her netting down and say, \"How _can you_ two sit there and listen\nto such a pack of lies?\" She objected strongly, in these later years, to\nthe theatre; and when sometimes her son would wish to take a party into\ntown to see the last new piece, her permission had to be asked, and was\nnot readily granted, unless to Miss Agnew, who was the ambassadress in\nsuch affairs of diplomacy. But while disapproving of some of his worldly\nways, and convinced that she had too much indulged his childhood, the\nold lady loved him with all the intensity of the strange fierce lioness\nnature, which only one or two had ever had a glimpse of. And when\n(December 5th, 1871) she died, trusting to see her husband again--not to\nbe near him, not to be so high in heaven but content if she might only\n_see_ him, she said--her son was left \"with a surprising sense of\nloneliness.\" He had loved her truly, obeyed her strictly and tended her\nfaithfully; and even yet hardly realized how much she had been to him.\nHe buried her in his father's grave, and wrote upon it, \"Here beside my\nfather's body I have laid my mother's: nor was dearer earth ever\nreturned to earth, nor purer life recorded in heaven.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\n\"FORS\" BEGUN (1871-1872)\n\n\nOn January 1st, 1871, was issued a small pamphlet, headed \"Fors\nClavigera,\" in the form of a letter to the working men and labourers of\nEngland, dated from Denmark Hill, and signed \"John Ruskin.\" It was not\npublished in the usual way, but sold by the author's engraver, Mr.\nGeorge Allen, at Heathfield Cottage, Keston, Kent. It was not\nadvertised; press-copies were sent to the leading papers; and of course\nthe author's acquaintance knew of its publication. Strangers, who heard\nof this curious proceeding, spread the report that in order to get\nRuskin's latest, you had to travel into the country, with your\nsevenpence in your hand, and transact your business among Mr. Allen's\nbeehives. So you had, if you wanted to see what you were buying; for no\narrangements were made for its sale by the booksellers: sevenpence a\ncopy, carriage paid, no discount, and no abatement on taking a quantity.\n\nBy such pilgrimages, but more easily through the post, the new work\nfiltered out, in monthly instalments, to a limited number of buyers.\nAfter three years the price was raised to tenpence. In 1875 the first\nthousands of the earlier numbers were sold: \"the public has a very long\nnose,\" Mr. Ruskin once said, \"and scents out what it wants, sooner or\nlater.\" A second edition was issued, bound up into yearly volumes, of\nwhich eight were ultimately completed. Meanwhile the work went on,\nsomething in the style of the old Addison _Spectator_; each part\ncontaining twenty pages, more or less, by Ruskin, with added\ncontributions from various correspondents.\n\nThe charm of \"Fors\" is neither in epigram nor in anecdote, but in the\nsustained vivacity that runs through the texture of the work; the\nreappearance of golden threads of thought, glittering in new figures,\nand among new colours; and throughout all the variety of subject a unity\nof style unlike the style of his earlier works, where flowery rhetorical\npassages are tagged to less interesting chapters, separately studied\nsermonettes interposed among the geology, and Johnson, Locke, Hooker,\nCarlyle--or whoever happened to be the author he was reading at the\ntime--frankly imitated. It was always clever, but often artificial; like\nthe composition of a Renaissance painter who inserts his _bel corpo\nignudo_ to catch the eye. In \"Fors,\" however, the web is of a piece, all\nsparkling with the same life; though as it is gradually unwound from the\nloom it is hard to judge the design. That can only be done when it is\nreviewed as a whole.\n\nAt the time, his mingling of jest and earnest was misunderstood even by\nfriends. The author learnt too painfully the danger of seeming to trifle\nwith cherished beliefs. He forswore levity, but soon relapsed into the\nold style, out of sheer sincerity: for he was too much in earnest not to\nbe frankly himself in his utterances, without writing up to, or down to,\nany other person's standard.\n\nRuskin did not wish to lead a colony or to head a revolution. He had\nbeen pondering for fifteen years the cause of poverty and crime, and the\nconviction had grown upon him that modern commercialism was at the root\nof it all. But his attacks on commercialism--his analysis of its bad\ninfluence on all sections of society--were too vigorous and\nuncompromising for the newspaper editors who received \"Fors,\" and even\nfor most of his private friends. There were, however, some who saw what\nhe was aiming at: and let it be remarked that his first encouragement\ncame from the highest quarters. Just as Sydney Smith, the chief critic\nof earlier days, had been the first to praise \"Modern Painters,\" in the\nteeth of vulgar opinion, so now Carlyle spoke for \"Fors.\"\n\n\"5, Cheyne Row, Chelsea, _April 30th_, 1871.\n\n\"Dear Ruskin,\n\n\"This 'Fors Clavigera,' Letter 5th, which I have just finished reading,\nis incomparable; a quasi-sacred consolation to me, which almost brings\ntears into my eyes! Every word of it is as if spoken, not out of my poor\nheart only, but out of the eternal skies; words winged with Empyrean\nwisdom, piercing as lightning,--and which I really do not remember to\nhave heard the like of. _Continue_, while you have such utterances in\nyou, to give them voice. They will find and force entrance into human\nhearts, _whatever_ the 'angle of incidence' may be; that is to say,\nwhether, for the degraded and _in_ human Blockheadism we, so-called\n'men,' have mostly now become, you come in upon them at the broadside,\nat the top, or even at the bottom. Euge, Euge!--Yours ever,\n\n\"T. Carlyle.\"\n\nOthers, like Sir Arthur Helps, joined in this encouragement. But the old\nstruggle with the newspapers began over again.\n\nThey united in considering the whole business insane, though they did\nnot doubt his sincerity when Ruskin put down his own money, the tenth of\nwhat he had, as he recommended his adherents to do. By the end of the\nyear he had set aside \u00a37,000 toward establishing a company to be called\nof \"St. George,\" as representing at once England and agriculture. Sir\nThomas Dyke Acland and the Right Hon. W. Cowper-Temple (afterwards Lord\nMount Temple), though not pledging themselves to approval of the scheme,\nundertook the trusteeship of the fund. A few friends subscribed; in\nJune, 1872, after a year and a half of \"Fors,\" the first stranger sent\nin his contribution, and at the end of three years \u00a3236 13s. were\ncollected, to add to his \u00a37,000, and a few acres of land were given.\n\nMeanwhile Ruskin practised what he preached. He did not preach\nrenunciation; he was not a Pessimist any more than an Optimist.\nSometimes he felt he was not doing enough; he knew very well that others\nthought so. I remember his saying, in his rooms at Oxford in one of\nthose years: \"Here I am, trying to reform the world, and I suppose I\nought to begin with myself, I am trying to do St. Benedict's work, and I\nought to be a saint. And yet I am living between a Turkey carpet and a\nTitian, and drinking as much tea\"--taking his second cup--\"as I can\n_swig_!\"\n\nThat was the way he put it to an undergraduate; to a lady friend he\nwrote later on, \"I'm reading history of early saints, too, for my Amiens\nbook, and feel that I ought to be scratched, or starved, or boiled, or\nsomething unpleasant; and I don't know if I'm a saint or a sinner in the\nleast, in medi\u00e6val language. How did the saints feel themselves, I\nwonder, about their saintship!\"\n\nIf he had forsaken all and followed the vocation of St. Francis,--he has\ndiscussed the question candidly in \"Fors\" for May, 1874--would not his\nwork have been more effectual, his example more inspiring? Conceivably:\nbut that was not his mission. His gospel was not one of asceticism; it\ncalled upon no one for any sort of suicide, or even martyrdom. He\nrequired of his followers that they should live their lives to the full\nin \"Admiration, Hope and Love\": and not that they should sacrifice\nthemselves in fasting and wearing of camels'-hair coats. He wished them\nto work, to be honest, and just, in all things immediately attainable.\nHe asked the tenth of their living--not the widow's two mites; and it\nwas deeply painful to him to find, sometimes, that they had so\ninterpreted his teaching: as when he wrote, later, to Miss Beever:\n\n\n     \"One of my poor 'Companions of St. George' who has sent me, not a\n     widow's but a parlour-maid's (an old schoolmistress) 'all her\n     living,' and whom I found last night, dying, slowly and quietly, in\n     a damp room, just the size of your study (which her landlord won't\n     mend the roof of), by the light of a single tallow candle,--dying,\n     I say, _slowly_ of consumption, not yet near the end, but\n     contemplating it with sorrow, mixed partly with fear lest she\n     should not have done all she could for her children! The sight of\n     this and my own shameful comforts, three wax candles and blazing\n     fire and dry roof, and Susie and Joanie for friends! Oh me, Susie,\n     what _is_ to become of me in the next world, who have in this life\n     all my good things!\"\n\nAfter carrying on \"Fors\" for some time his attention was drawn by Mr.\nW.C. Sillar to the question of \"Usury.\" At first he had seen no crying\nsin in Interest. He had held that the \"rights of capital\" were\nvisionary, and that the tools should belong to him that can handle them,\nin a perfect state of society; but he thought that the existing system\nwas no worse in this respect than in others, and his expectation of\nreform in the plan of investment went hand-in-hand with his hope of a\ngood time coming in everything else. So he quietly accepted his rents,\nas he accepted his Professorship, for example, thinking it his business\nto be a good landlord and spend his money generously, just as he thought\nit his business to retain the existing South Kensington drawing school,\nand the Oxford system of education--not at all his ideal--and to make\nthe best use of them.\n\nA lady who was his pupil in drawing, and a believer in his ideals of\nphilanthropy, Miss Octavia Hill, undertook to help him in 1864 in\nefforts to reclaim part--though a very small part--of the lower-class\ndwellings of London. Half a dozen houses in Marylebone left by Ruskin's\nfather, to which he added three more in Paradise Place, as it was\neuphemistically named, were the subjects of their experiment. They were\nridiculed at first; but by the noblest endeavour they succeeded, and set\nan example which has been followed in many of our towns with great\nresults. They showed what a wise and kind landlord could do by caring\nfor tenants, by giving them habitable dwellings, recreation ground and\nfixity of tenure, and requiring in return a reasonable and moderate\nrent. He got five per cent. for his capital, instead of twelve or more,\nwhich such property generally returns, or at that time returned.\n\nBut when he began to write against rent and interest there were plenty\nof critics ready to cite this and other investments as a damning\ninconsistency. He was not the man to offer explanations at any time. It\nwas no defence to say that he took less and did more than other\nlandlords. And so he was glad to part with the whole to Miss Hill; nor\ndid he care to spend upon himself the \u00a33,500, which I believe was the\nprice. It went right and left in gifts; till one day he cheerfully\nremarked:\n\n    \"It's a' gane awa'\n    Like snaw aff a wa'.\"\n\n\"Is there really nothing to show for it?\" he was asked. \"Nothing,\" he\nsaid, \"except this new silk umbrella.\"\n\nHe had talked so much of the possibility of carrying on honest and\nhonourable retail trade, that he felt bound to exemplify his principles.\nHe took a house No. 19, Paddington Street, with a corner shop, near his\nMarylebone property, and set himself up in business as a teaman. Mr.\nArthur Severn painted the sign, in neat blue letters; the window was\ndecked with fine old china, bought from a Cavaliere near Siena, whose\nunique collection had been introduced to notice by Professor Norton; and\nMiss Harrie Tovey, an old servant of Denmark Hill, was established\nthere, like Miss Mattie in \"Cranford,\" or rather like one of the\nsalaried officials of \"Time and Tide,\" to dispense the unadulterated\nleaf to all comers. No advertisements, no self-recommendation, no\ncatchpenny tricks of trade were allowed; and yet the business went on,\nand, I am assured, prospered with legitimate profits. At first, various\nkinds of the best tea only were sold; but it seemed to the tenant of the\nshop that coffee and sugar ought to be included in the list. This was\nnot at all in Ruskin's programme, and there were great debates at home\nabout it. At last he gave way, on the understanding that the shop was to\nbe responsible for the proper roasting of the coffee according to the\nbest recipe. After some time Miss Tovey died. And when, in the autumn of\n1876, Miss Octavia Hill proposed to take the house and business over and\nwork it with the rest of the Marylebone property, the offer was\nthankfully accepted.\n\nAnother of his principles was cleanliness; \"the speedy abolition of all\nabolishable filth is the first process of education.\" He undertook to\nkeep certain streets, not crossings only, cleaner than the public seemed\nto care for, between the British Museum and St. Giles'. He took the\nbroom himself, for a start, put on his gardener, Downes, as foreman of\nthe job, and engaged a small staff of helpers. The work began, as he\npromised, in a humorous letter to the _Pall Matt Gazette_ upon New\nYear's Day, 1872, and he kept his three sweepers at work for eight hours\ndaily \"to show a bit of our London streets kept as clean as the deck of\na ship of the line.\"\n\nThere were some difficulties, too. One of the staff was an extremely\nhandsome and lively shoeblack, picked up in St. Giles'. It turned out\nthat he was not unknown to the world: he had sat to artists--to Mr.\nEdward Clifford, to Mr. Severn; and went by the name of \"Cheeky.\" Every\nnow and then Ruskin \"and party\" drove round to inspect the works.\nDownes could not be everywhere at once: and Cheeky used to be caught at\npitch and toss or marbles in unswept Museum Street. Ruskin rarely, if\never, dismissed a servant; but street sweeping was not good enough for\nCheeky, and so he enlisted. The army was not good enough, and so he\ndeserted; and was last seen disappearing into the darkness, after\ncalling a cab for his old friends one night at the Albert Hall.\n\nOne more escapade of this most unpractical man, as they called him.\nSince his fortune was rapidly melting away, he had to look to his works\nas an ultimate resource: they eventually became his only means of\nlivelihood. One might suppose that he would be anxious to put his\npublishing business on the most secure and satisfactory footing; to\nfacilitate sale, and to ensure profit. But he had views. He objected to\nadvertising; though he thought that in his St. George's Scheme he would\nhave a yearly Book Gazette drawn up by responsible authorities,\nindicating the best works. He distrusted the system of _unacknowledged_\nprofits and percentages, though he fully agreed that the retailer should\nbe paid for his work, and wished, in an ideal state, to see the\nshopkeeper a salaried official. He disliked the bad print and paper of\nthe cheap literature of that day, and knew that people valued more\nhighly what they did not get so easily. He had changed his mind with\nregard to one or two things--religion and glaciers chiefly--about which\nhe had written at length in earlier works.\n\nSo he withdrew his most popular books--\"Modern Painters\" and the\nrest--from circulation, though he was persuaded by the publisher to\nreprint \"Modern Painters\" and \"Stones of Venice\" once more--\"positively\nfor the last time,\" as they said the plates would give no more good\nimpressions. He had his later writings printed in a rather expensive\nstyle; at first through Smith & Elder, after two years by Messrs. Watson\n& Hazell (later Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ltd.), and the method of\npublication is illustrated in the history of \"Sesame and Lilies,\" the\nfirst volume of these \"collected works.\" It was issued by Smith &\nElder, May, 1871, at 7s., to the trade only, leaving the retailer to fix\nthe price to the public. In September, 1872, the work was also supplied\nby Mr. George Allen, and the price raised to 9s.6d., (carriage paid)\nto trade and public alike, with the idea that an extra shilling, or\nnearly ten per cent., might be added by the bookseller for his trouble\nin ordering the work. If he did not add the commission, that was his own\naffair; though with postage of order and payment, when only one or two\ncopies at a time were asked for, this did not leave much margin. So it\nwas doubled, by the simple expedient of doubling the price!--or, to be\naccurate, raising it to 18s. (carriage paid) for 20s. over the counter.\nIt was freely prophesied by business men that this would not do:\nhowever, at the end of fifteen years the _sixth edition_ of this work in\nthis form was being sold, in spite of the fact that, five years before,\na smaller reprint of the same book had been brought out at 5s., and was\nthen in its fourth edition of 3,000 copies each.\n\nCompared with the enormous sale of sensational novels and school books,\nthis is no great matter; but for a didactic work, offered to the public\nwithout advertisement, and in the face of the almost universal\nopposition of the book-selling trade, it means not only that, as an\nauthor, Ruskin had made a secure reputation, but also that he deserved\nthe curious tribute once paid him by the journal of a big modern shop\n(Compton House, Liverpool) as a \"great tradesman.\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nOXFORD TEACHING (1872-1875)\n\n\nEarly in 1872, after bringing out \"Munera Pulveris,\" the essays he had\nwritten ten years before for _Fraser_ on economy; after getting those\nstreet-sweepers to work near the British Museum where he was making\nstudies of animals and Greek sculpture; and after once more addressing\nthe Woolwich cadets, this time[25] on the Bird of Calm (the mythology of\nthe Halcyon), Professor Ruskin went to Oxford to give a course of ten\nlectures[26] on the Relation of Natural Science to Art, afterwards\npublished under the title of \"The Eagle's Nest.\" He wrote to Professor\nNorton:\n\n[Footnote 25: January 13, 1872.]\n\n[Footnote 26: Feb. 8, 10, 15, 17, 22, 24. 29; March 2, 7, and 9.]\n\n\n     \"I am, as usual, unusually busy. When I get fairly into my lecture\n     work at Oxford I always find the lecture would come better some\n     other way, just before it is given, and so work from hand to mouth.\n     I am always unhappy, and see no good in saying so. But I am\n     settling to my work here--recklessly--to do my best with it:\n     feeling quite sure that it is talking at hazard for what chance\n     good may come. But I attend regularly in the schools as mere\n     drawing-master, and the men begin to come in one by one, about\n     fifteen or twenty already; several worth having as pupils in any\n     way, being of temper to make good growth of.\"\n\nWhy was he always unhappy? It was not that Mr. W.B. Scott criticised\n\"Ruskin's influence\" in that March; or that by Easter he had to say\nfarewell to his old home on Denmark Hill, and settle \"for good\" at\nBrantwood. Nor that he could go abroad again for a long summer in Italy\nwith Mr. and Mrs. Severn and the Hilliards and Mr. Albert Goodwin. They\nstarted about the middle of April, and on the journey out he wrote,\nbeside his \"Fors\" which always went on, a preface to the Rev. R. St.\nJohn Tyrwhitt's \"Christian Art and Symbolism.\" He drew the Apse at Pisa,\nhalf-amused and half-worried by the little ragamuffin who varied the\ntedium of watching his work by doing horizontal-bar tricks on the\nrailings of the Cathedral green. Then to Lucca, where, to show his\nfriends something of Italian landscape, he took them for rambles through\nthe olive farms and chestnut woods, among which Miss Hilliard lost her\njewelled cross. Greatly to Ruskin's delight, as a firm believer in\nItalian peasant-virtue, it was found and returned without hint of\nreward.\n\nAt Rome they visited old Mr. Severn, and then went homeward by way of\nVerona, where Ruskin wrote an account of the Cavalli monuments for the\nArundel society, and Venice, where he returned to the study of\nCarpaccio. At Rome he had been once more to the Sistine, and found that\non earlier visits the ceiling and the Last Judgment had taken his\nattention too exclusively. Now that he could look away from Michelangelo\nhe become conscious of the claims of Botticelli's frescoes, which\nrepresent, in the Florentine school, somewhat the same kind of interest\nthat he had found in Carpaccio. He became enamoured of Botticelli's\nZipporah, and resolved to study the master more closely. On reaching\nhome he had to prepare \"The Eagle's Nest\" for publication; in the\npreface he gave special importance to Botticelli, and amplified it in\nlectures on early engraving, that Autumn;[27] in which I remember his\nquoting with appreciation the passage on the Venus Anadyomene from\nPater's \"Studies in the Renaissance\" just published.\n\n[Footnote 27: \"Ariadne Florentina,\" delivered on Nov. 2, 9, 16, 23, 30,\nand Dec. 7, and repeated on the following Thursdays. Ruskin's first\nmention of Botticelli was in the course on Landscape, Lent Term, 1871.]\n\nThis sudden enthusiasm about an unknown painter amused the Oxford\npublic: and it became a standing joke among the profane to ask who was\nRuskin's last great man. It was in answer to that, and in expression of\na truer understanding than most Oxford pupils attained, that Bourdillon\nof Worcester wrote on \"the Ethereal Ruskin,\"--that was Carlyle's name\nfor him:--\n\n    \"To us this star or that seems bright,\n    And oft some headlong meteor's flight\n    Holds for awhile our raptured sight.\n\n    \"But he discerns each noble star;\n    The least is only the most far,\n    Whose worlds, may be, the mightiest are.\"\n\nThe critical value of this course however, to a student of art-history,\nis impaired by his using as illustrations of Botticelli, and of the\nmanner of engraving which he took for standard, certain plates which\nwere erroneously attributed to the artist. \"It is strange,\" he wrote in\ndespair to Professor Norton, \"that I hardly ever get anything stated\nwithout some grave mistake, however true in my main discourse.\" But in\nthis case a fate stronger than he had taken him unawares. The\ncircumstances do not extenuate the error of the Professor, but they\nexplain the difficulties under which his work was done. The cloud that\nrested on his own life was the result of a strange and wholly unexpected\ntragedy in another's.\n\nIt was an open secret--his attachment to a lady, who had been his pupil,\nand was now generally understood to be his _fianc\u00e9e_. She was far\nyounger than he; but at fifty-three he was not an old man; and the\nfriends who fully knew and understood the affair favoured his intentions\nand joined in the hope, and in auguries for the happiness for which he\nhad been so long waiting. But now that it came to the point the lady\nfinally decided that it was impossible. He was not at one with her in\nreligious matters. He could speak lightly of her evangelical creed--it\nseemed he scoffed in \"Fors\" at her faith. She could not be unequally\nyoked with an unbeliever. To her, the alternative was plain; the choice\nwas terrible: yet, having once seen her path, she turned resolutely\naway.[28]\n\n[Footnote 28: In former editions the following sentence was added:\n\"Three years after, as she lay dying, he begged to see her once more.\nShe sent to ask whether he could yet say that he loved God better than\nhe loved her; and when he said 'No,' her door was closed upon him for\never.\" The statement was suggested by information from Ruskin in later\ndays. I must, however, have misrepresented the facts, as the lady's\nmother has left it in writing that no such incident occurred.]\n\nMeanwhile, in the bitterest despair he sought refuge as he had done\nbefore, in his work. He accepted the lesson, though he, too, could not\nrecant; still he tried to correct his apparent levity in the renewed\nseriousness and more earnest tone of \"Fors,\" speaking more plainly and\nmore simply, but without concession. He wrote on the next Christmas Eve\nto an Aberdeen Bible-class teacher:\n\n\n     \"If you care to give your class a word directly from me, say to\n     them that they will find it well, throughout life, never to trouble\n     themselves about what they ought _not_ to do, but about what they\n     _ought_ to do. The condemnation given from the Judgment\n     Throne--most solemnly described--is all for the _undones_ and not\n     for the _dones_. People are perpetually afraid of doing wrong; but\n     unless they are doing its reverse energetically, they do it all day\n     long, and the degree does not matter. Make your young hearers\n     resolve to be honest in their work in this life. Heaven will take\n     care of them for the other.\"\n\nThat was all he could say: he did not _know_ there was another life: he\n_hoped_ there was: and yet, if he were not a saint or a Christian, was\nthere any man in the world who was nearer to the kingdom of Heaven than\nthis stubborn heretic?\n\nHis heretical attitude was singular. He was just as far removed from\nadopting the easy antagonism of science to religion as from siding with\nreligion against science. In a paper singularly interesting--and in his\nbiography important--on the \"Nature and Authority of Miracle,\" read to\nthe Metaphysical Society (February 11, 1873), he tried to clear up his\nposition and to state a qualified belief in the supernatural.\n\nWith that year expired the term for which he had been elected to the\nSlade Professorship, and in January 1873 he was re-elected. In his first\nthree years he had given five courses of lectures designed to introduce\nan encyclop\u00e6dic review and reconstruction of all he had to say upon art.\nBeginning with general principles, he had proceeded to their application\nin history, by tracing certain phases of Greek sculpture, and by\ncontrasting the Greek and the Gothic spirit as shown in the treatment of\nlandscape, from which he went on to the study of early engraving. The\napplication of his principles to theory was made in the course on\nScience and Art (\"The Eagle's Nest\"). Now, on his re-election, he\nproceeded to take up these two sides of his subject, and to illustrate\nthis view of the right way to apply science to art, by a course on\nBirds, in Nature, Art and Mythology, and next year by a study of Alpine\nforms. The historical side was continued with lectures on Niccola Pisano\nand early Tuscan sculpture, and in 1874 with an important, though\nunpublished, course on Florentine Art.\n\nIt is to this cycle of lectures that we must look for that matured\nRuskinian theory of art which his early works do not reach; and which\nhis writings between 1860 and 1870 do not touch. Though the Oxford\nlectures are only a fragment of what he ought to have done, they should\nbe sufficient to a careful reader; though their expression is sometimes\nobscured by diffuse treatment, they contain the root of the matter,\nthought out for fifteen years since the close of the more brilliant, but\nless profound, period of \"Modern Painters.\"\n\nThe course on Birds[29] was given in the drawing school at the\nUniversity Galleries. The room was not large enough for the numbers that\ncrowded to hear Professor Ruskin, and each of these lectures, like the\nprevious and the following courses, had to be repeated to a second\naudience. Great pains had been given to their preparation--much greater\nthan the easy utterance and free treatment of his theme led his hearers\nto believe. For these lectures and their sequel, published as \"Love's\nMeinie,\" he collected an enormous number of skins--to compare the\nplumage and wings of different species; for his work was with the\n_outside_ aspect and structure of birds, not with their anatomy. He had\nmodels made, as large as swords, of the different quill-feathers, to\nexperiment on their action and resistance to the air. He got a valuable\nseries of drawings by H.S. Marks, R.A., and made many careful and\nbeautiful studies himself of feathers and of birds at the Zoological\nGardens, and the British Museum; and after all, he had to conclude his\nwork saying, \"It has been throughout my trust that if death should write\non these, 'What this man began to build, he was not able to finish,' God\nmay also write on them, not in anger, but in aid, 'A stronger than he\ncometh.'\"\n\n[Footnote 29: March 15, May 2 and 9; repeated March 19, May 5, and 12,\n1873.]\n\nTwo of the lectures on birds were repeated at Eton[30] before the boys'\nLiterary and Scientific Society and their friends; and between this and\n1880 Ruskin often went to address the same audience, with the same\ninterest in young people that had taken him in earlier years to\nWoolwich.\n\n[Footnote 30: May 10 and 17.]\n\nAfter a long vacation at Brantwood, the first spent there, he went up to\ngive his course on Early Tuscan Art (\"Val d'Arno\")[31]. The lectures\nwere printed separately and sold at the conclusion and the first numbers\nwere sent to Carlyle, whose unabated interest in his friend's work was\nshown in his letter of Oct. 31st: \"_Perge, perge_;--and, as the Irish\nsay, 'more power to your elbow!' I have yet read this 'Val d'Arno' only\nonce. Froude snatched it away from me yesterday; and it has then to go\nto my brother at Dumfries. After that I shall have it back....\"\n\n[Footnote 31: On Mondays and Thursdays, Oct. 21, 23, 27, 30, Nov. 3, 6,\n10, 13, 17, 20; repeated on the Wednesdays and Fridays following.]\n\nDuring that summer and autumn Ruskin suffered from nights of\nsleeplessness or unnaturally vivid dreams and days of unrest and\nfeverish energy, alternating with intense fatigue. The eighteen lectures\nin less than six weeks, a \"combination of prophecy and play-acting,\" as\nCarlyle had called it in his own case, and the unfortunate discussion\nwith an old-fashioned economist who undertook to demolish Ruskinism\nwithout understanding it, added to the causes of which we are already\naware, brought him to New Year, 1874, in \"failing strength, care, and\nhope.\" He sought quiet at the seaside, but found modern hotel-life\nintolerable; he went back to town and tried the pantomimes for\ndistraction,--saw Kate Vaughan in Cinderella, and Violet Cameron in Jack\nin the Box, over and over again, and found himself:\n\n\n     \"Now hopelessly a man of the world!--of that woeful outside one, I\n     mean. It is now Sunday; half-past eleven in the morning. Everybody\n     else is gone to church--and I am left alone with the cat, in the\n     world of sin.\"\n\nThinking himself better, he went to Oxford, and announced a course on\nAlpine form; but after a week was obliged to retreat and go home to\nConiston, still hoping to return and give his lectures. But it was no\nuse. The gloom without deepened the gloom within; and he took the wisest\ncourse in trying Italy, alone this time with his old servant Crawley.\n\nThe greater part of 1874 was spent abroad--first travelling through\nSavoy and by the Riviera to Assisi, where he wrote to Miss S. Beever:\n\n\n     \"The Sacristan gives me my coffee for lunch in his own little cell,\n     looking out on the olive woods; then he tells me stories of\n     conversions and miracles, and then perhaps we go into the sacristy\n     and have a reverent little poke-out of relics. Fancy a great carved\n     cupboard in a vaulted chamber full of most precious things (the\n     box which the Holy Virgin's veil used to be kept in, to begin\n     with), and leave to rummage in it at will! Things that are only\n     shown twice in the year or so, with fumigation! all the\n     congregation on their knees--and the sacristan and I having a great\n     heap of them on the table at once, like a dinner service. I really\n     looked with great respect on St. Francis's old camel-hair dress.\"\n\nThence he went to visit Colonel and Mrs. Yule at Palermo, deeply\ninterested in Scylla and Charybdis, Etna and the metopes of Selinus. His\ninterest in Greek art had been shown, not only in a course of lectures,\nbut in active support to arch\u00e6ological explorations. He said once, \"I\nbelieve heartily in diggings, of all sorts.\" Meeting General L.P. di\nCesnola and hearing of the wealth of ancient remains in Cyprus then\nnewly discovered, Mr. Ruskin placed \u00a31,000 at his disposal. General di\nCesnola was able, in April, 1875, to announce that in spite of the\nconfiscation of half the treasure-trove by the local Government, he had\nshipped a cargo of antiquities, including many vases, terra-cottas, and\nfragments of sculpture. Whence, precisely, these relics came is now\ndoubtful.\n\nThe landscape of Theocritus and the remains of ancient glories roused\nhim to energetic sketching--a sign of returning strength, which\ncontinued when he reached Rome, and enabled him to make a very fine copy\nof Botticelli's Zipporah, and other details of the Sistine frescoes.\n\nLate in October he reached England, just able to give the promised\nLectures on Alpine forms,[32]--I remember his curious attempt to\nillustrate the n\u00e9v\u00e9-masses by pouring flour on a model;--and a second\ncourse on the \u00c6sthetic and Mathematic schools of Florence;[33] and a\nlecture on Botticelli at Eton, of which the Literary and Scientific\nSociety's minute-book contains the following report:\n\n[Footnote 32: Oct. 27, 30; Nov. 3 and 6, 1874.]\n\n[Footnote 33: Nov. 10, 13, 17, 20, 24, 27; Dec. 1 and 4, 1874.]\n\n\n     \"On Saturday, Dec. 12th (1874), Professor Ruskin lectured before a\n     crowded, influential and excited audience, which comprised our\n     noble Society and a hundred and thirty gentlemen and ladies, who\n     eagerly accepted an invitation to hear Professor Ruskin 'talk' to\n     us on Botticelli. It is utterly impossible for the unfortunate\n     secretary of the Society to transmit to writing even an abstract of\n     this address; and it is some apology for him when beauty of\n     expression, sweetness of voice, and elegance in imagery defy the\n     utmost efforts of the pen.\"\n\nJust before leaving for Italy he had been told that the Royal Institute\nof British Architects intended to present him with their Gold Medal in\nacknowledgment of his services to the cause of architecture; and during\nhis journey official announcement of the award reached him. He dictated\nfrom Assisi (June 12, 1874) a letter to Sir Gilbert Scott, explaining\nwhy he declined the honour intended him. He said in effect that if it\nhad been offered at a time when he had been writing on architecture it\nwould have been welcome; but it was not so now that he felt all his\nefforts to have been in vain and the profession as a body engaged in\nwork--such as the \"restoration\" of ancient buildings--with which he had\nno sympathy. It had been represented to him that his refusal to accept a\nRoyal Medal would be a reflection upon the Royal donor. To which he\nreplied:\n\n\n     \"Having entirely loyal feelings towards the Queen, I will trust to\n     her Majesty's true interpretation of my conduct; but if formal\n     justification of it be necessary for the public, would plead that\n     if a Peerage or Knighthood may without disloyalty be refused,\n     surely much more the minor grace proceeding from the monarch may be\n     without impropriety declined by any of her Majesty's subjects who\n     wish to serve her without reward, under the exigency of peculiar\n     circumstances.\"\n\nIt was only the term before that Prince Leopold had been at Oxford, a\nconstant attendant on Ruskin's lectures, and a visitor to his drawing\nschool. The gentle prince, with his instinct for philanthropy, was not\nto be deterred by the utterances of \"Fors\" from respecting the genius of\nthe Professor; and the Professor, with his old-world, cavalier loyalty,\nreadily returned the esteem and affection of his new pupil. A sincere\nfriendship was formed, lasting until the Prince's death.\n\nIn June, 1875, Princess Alice and her husband, with Prince Arthur and\nPrince Leopold, were at Oxford. Ruskin had just made arrangements\ncompleting his gifts to the University galleries and schools. The Royal\nparty showed great interest in the Professor and his work. The Princess,\nthe Grand Duke of Hesse, and Prince Leopold acted as witnesses to the\ndeed of gift, and Prince Arthur and Prince Leopold accepted the\ntrusteeship.\n\nWith all the Slade Professor's generosity, the Ruskin drawing school,\nfounded in these fine galleries to which he had so largely contributed,\nin a palatial hall handsomely furnished, and hung with Tintoret and\nLuini, Burne-Jones and Rossetti, and other rare masters, ancient and\nmodern; with the most interesting examples to copy--at the most\nconvenient of desks, we may add--yet in spite of it all, the drawing\nschool was not a popular institution. When the Professor was personally\nteaching, he got some fifteen or twenty--if not to attend, at any rate\nto join. But whenever the chief attraction could not be counted on, the\nattendance sank to an average of two or three. The cause was simple. An\nundergraduate is supposed to spend his morning in lectures, his\nafternoon in taking exercise, and his evening in college. There is\nsimply no time in his scheme for going to a drawing school. If it were\nrecognised as part of the curriculum, if it counted in any way along\nwith other studies, or contributed to a \"school\" akin to that of music,\npractical art might become teachable at Oxford; and Professor Ruskin's\ngifts and endowments--to say nothing of his hopes and plans--would not\nbe wholly in vain.\n\nAs he could not make the undergraduates draw, he made them dig. He had\nnoticed a very bad bit of road on the Hinksey side, and heard that it\nwas nobody's business to mend it: meanwhile the farmers' carts and\ncasual pedestrians were bemired. He sent for his gardener Downes, who\nhad been foreman of the street-sweepers; laid in a stock of picks and\nshovels; took lessons in stone-breaking himself, and called on his\nfriends to spend their recreation times in doing something useful.\n\nMany of the disciples met at the weekly open breakfasts at the\nProfessor's rooms in Corpus; and he was glad of a talk to them on other\nthings beside drawing and digging. Some were attracted chiefly by the\ncelebrity of the man, or by the curiosity of his humorous discourse; but\nthere were a few who partly grasped one side or other of his mission and\ncharacter. The most brilliant undergraduate of the time, seen at this\nbreakfast table, but not one of the diggers, was W.H. Mallock,\nafterwards widely known as the author of \"Is Life Worth Living?\" He was\nthe only man. Professor Ruskin said, who really understood\nhim--referring to \"The New Republic.\" But while Mallock saw the\nreactionary and pessimistic side of his Oxford teacher, there was a\nprogressist and optimistic side which does not appear in his \"Mr.\nHerbert.\" That was discovered by another man whose career, short as it\nwas, proved even more influential. Arnold Toynbee was one of the\nProfessor's warmest admirers and ablest pupils: and in his philanthropic\nwork the teaching of \"Unto this Last\" and \"Fors\" was illustrated--not\nexclusively--but truly. \"No true disciple of mine will ever be a\nRuskinian\" (to quote \"St. Mark's Rest\"); \"he will follow, not me, but\nthe instincts of his own soul, and the guidance of its Creator.\"\n\nLike all energetic men, Ruskin was fond of setting other people to work.\nOne of his plans was to form a little library of standard books\n(\"Bibliotheca Pastorum\") suitable for the kind of people who, he hoped,\nwould join or work under his St. George's Company. The first book he\nchose was the \"Economist\" of Xenophon, which he asked two of his young\nfriends to translate. To them and their work he would give his\nafternoons in the rooms at Corpus, with curious patience in the midst of\npre-occupying labour and severest trial; for just then he was lecturing\nat the London Institution on the Alps[34]--reading a paper to the\nMetaphysical Society[35]--writing the Academy Notes of 1875, and\n\"Proserpina,\" etc.--as well as his regular work at \"Fors,\" and the St.\nGeorge's Company was then taking definite form;--and all the while the\nlady of his love was dying under the most tragic circumstances, and he\nforbidden to approach her.\n\n[Footnote 34: \"The Simple Dynamic Conditions of Glacial Action among the\nAlps,\" March 11, 1875.]\n\n[Footnote 35: \"Social Policy based on Natural Selection,\" May 11.]\n\nAt the end of May she died. On the 1st of June the Royal party honoured\nthe Slade Professor with their visit--little knowing how valueless to\nhim such honours had become. He went north[36] and met his translators\nat Brantwood to finish the Xenophon,--and to help dig his harbour and\ncut coppice in his wood. He prepared a preface; but the next term was\none of greater pressure, with the twelve lectures on Sir Joshua Reynolds\nto deliver. He wrote, after Christmas:\n\n[Footnote 36: \"On a posting tour through Yorkshire\". He made three such\ntours in 1875--southward in January, northward in June and July, and\nsouthward in September: and another northward in April and May, 1876.]\n\n\n     \"Now that I have got my head fairly into this Xenophon business, it\n     has expanded into a new light altogether; and I think it would be\n     absurd in me to slur over the life in one paragraph. A hundred\n     things have come into my head as I arrange the dates, and I think I\n     can make a much better thing of it--with a couple of days' work. My\n     head would not work in town--merely turned from side to side--never\n     nodded (except sleepily). I send you the proofs just to show you\n     I'm at work. I'm going to translate all the story of Delphic answer\n     before Anabasis: and his speech after the sleepless night.\"\n\nDelphic answers--for he was then again brought into contact with\n\"spiritualism\"; and sleepless nights--for the excitement of overwork was\ntelling upon him--were becoming too frequent in his own experience; and\nyet the lectures on Reynolds went off with success.[37] The magic of his\noratory transmuted the scribbled jottings of his MS. into a magnificent\nflow of rolling paragraph and rounded argument that thrilled a captious\naudience with unwonted emotion, and almost persuaded many a hearer to\naccept the gospel of \"the Ethereal Ruskin.\" In spite of a sense of\nantagonism to his surroundings, he did useful work which none other\ncould do in the University. That this was acknowledged was proved by his\nre-election, early in 1876: but his third term of three years was a time\nof weakened health. Repeated absence from his post and inability to\nfulfil his duties made it obviously his wisest course, at the end of\nthat term, to resign the Slade Professorship.\n\n[Footnote 37: Nov. 2, 4, 6, 9, 11, 13, 16, 18, 20, 23, 25, and 27;\n1875.]\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nST. GEORGE AND ST. MARK (1875-1877)\n\n\nIn the book his Bertha of Canterbury was reading at twilight on the Eve\nof St. Mark, Keats might have been describing \"Fors.\" Among its pages,\nfascinating with their golden broideries of romance and wit, perplexing\nwith mystic vials of wrath as well as all the Seven Lamps and Shekinah\nof old and new Covenants commingled, there was gradually unfolded the\nplan of \"St. George's Work.\"\n\nThe scheme was not easy to apprehend; it was essentially different from\nanything then known, though superficially like several bankrupt Utopias.\nRuskin did not want to found a phalanstery, or to imitate Robert Owen\nor the Shakers. That would have been practicable--and useless.\n\nHe wanted much more. He aimed at the gradual introduction of higher aims\ninto ordinary life: it giving true refinement to the lower classes, true\nsimplicity to the upper. He proposed that idle hands should reclaim\nwaste lands; that healthy work and country homes should be offered to\ntownsfolk who would \"come out of the gutter.\" He asked land-owners and\nemployers to furnish opportunities for such reforms;--which would\ninvolve no elaborate organization nor unelastic rules;--simply the one\nthing needful, the refusal of Commercialism.\n\nAs before, he scorned the idea that real good could be done by political\nagitation. Any government would work, he said, if it were an efficient\ngovernment. No government was efficient unless it saw that every one had\nthe necessaries of life, for body and soul; and that every one earned\nthem by some work or other. Capital--that is, the means and material of\nlabour, should therefore be in the hands of the Government, not in the\nhands of individuals: this reform would result easily and necessarily\nfrom the forbidding of loans on interest. Personal property would still\nbe in private hands; but as it could not be invested and turned into\ncapital, it would necessarily be restricted to its actual use, and great\naccumulation would be valueless.\n\nThis is, of course, a very sketchy statement of the ground-work of\n\"Fors,\" but to most readers nowadays as comprehensible as, at the time\nof its publication, it was incomprehensible. For when, long after \"Fors\"\nhad been written, Ruskin found other writers advocating the same\nprinciples and calling themselves Socialists, he said that he too was a\nSocialist.\n\nBut the Socialists of various sects have complicated, and sometimes\nconfused, their simple fundamental principles with various ways and\nmeans; to which he could not agree. He had his own ways and means. He\nhad his private ideals of life, which he expounded, along with his main\ndoctrine. He thought, justifiably, that theory was useless without\npractical example; and so he founded St. George's Company (in 1877\ncalled St. George's Guild) as his illustration.\n\nThe Guild grew out of his call, in 1871, for adherents: and by 1875\nbegan to take definite form. Its objects were to set the example of a\ncommon capital as opposed to a National debt, and of co-operative labour\nas opposed to competitive struggle for life. Each member was required to\ndo some work for his living--without too strict limits as to the\nkind--and to practice certain precepts of religion and morality, broad\nenough for general acceptance. He was also required to obey the\nauthority of the Guild, and to contribute a tithe of his income to a\ncommon fund, for various objects. These objects were--first: to buy land\nfor the agricultural members to cultivate, paying their rent, not to the\nother members, but to the company; not refusing machinery, but\npreferring manual labour. Next, to buy mills and factories, to be\nlikewise owned by the Guild and worked by members--using water power in\npreference to steam (steam at first not forbidden)--and making the lives\nof the people employed as well spent as might be, with a fair wage,\nhealthy work, and so forth. The loss on starting was to be made up from\nthe Guild store, but it was anticipated that the honesty of the goods\nturned out would ultimately make such enterprises pay, even in a\ncommercial world. Then, for the people employed and their families,\nthere would be places of recreation and instruction, supplied by the\nGuild, and intended to give the agricultural labourer or mill-hand,\ntrained from infancy in Guild schools, some insight into Literature,\nScience and Art--and tastes which his easy position would leave him free\nto cultivate.\n\nSo far the plan was simple. It was not a _colony_--but merely the\nworking of existing industries in a certain way. Anticipating further\ndevelopment of the scheme, Ruskin looked forward to a guild coinage, as\npretty as the Florentines had; a costume as becoming as the Swiss: and\nother Platonically devised details, which were not the essentials of the\nproposal, and never came into operation. But some of his plans were\nactually realised.\n\nThe chief objects of \"St. George\" come under three heads, as we have\njust noticed: agricultural, industrial, and educational. The actual\nschools would not be needed until the farms and mills had been so far\nestablished as to secure a permanent attendance. But meanwhile provision\nwas being made for them, both in literature and in art. The \"Bibliotheca\nPastorum,\" was to be a comprehensive little library--far less than the\n100 books of the _Pall Mall Gazette_--and yet bringing before the St.\nGeorge's workman standard and serious writing of all times. It was to\ninclude, in separate volumes, the Books of Moses and the Psalms of David\nand the Revelation of St. John. Of Greek, the Economist of Xenophon, and\nHesiod, which Ruskin undertook to translate into prose. Of Latin the\nfirst two Georgics and sixth \u00c6neid of Virgil, in Gawain Douglas'\ntranslation. Dante; Chaucer, excluding the \"Canterbury Tales\"--but\nincluding the \"Romance of the Rose\"; Gotthelf's \"Ulric the Farmer,\" from\nthe French version which Ruskin had loved ever since his father used to\nread it him on their first tours in Switzerland; and an early English\nhistory by an Oxford friend. Later were published Sir Philip Sidney's\npsalter, and Ruskin's own biography of Sir Herbert Edwardes, under the\ntitle of \"A Knight's Faith.\"\n\nThese books were for the home library; reference works were bought to be\ndeposited in central libraries, along with objects of art and science.\nIt was not intended to keep the Guild property centralised; but rather\nto spread it, as its other work was spread, broad-cast. A number of\nbooks and other objects were bought with the Guild money, and lent or\ngiven to various schools and colleges and institutions where work akin\nto the objects of the Guild was being done. But for the time Ruskin\nfixed upon Sheffield as the place of his first Guild Museum--being the\nhome of the typical English industry--central to all parts of England,\nnear beautiful hill-country, and yet not far from a number of\nmanufacturing towns in which, if St. George's work went on, supporters\nand recruits might be found.\n\nThe people of Sheffield were already, in 1875, building a museum of\ntheir own, and naturally thought that the two might be conveniently\nworked together. But that was not at all what Ruskin wished. Not only\nwas his museum to be primarily the storehouse of the Guild, rather than\none among many means of popular education; but the objects which he\nintended to place there were not such as the public expected to see. He\nhad no interest in a vast accumulation of articles of all kinds. He\nwanted to provide for his friends' common treasury a few definitely\nvaluable and interesting examples--interesting to the sort of people\nthat he hoped would join the Guild or be bred up in it; and valuable\naccording to his own standard and experience.\n\nIn September 1875, Ruskin stayed a couple of days at Sheffield to\ninspect a cottage at Walkley, in the outskirts of the town, and to make\narrangements for founding the museum--humbly to begin with, but hoping\nfor speedy increase. He engaged as curator, at a salary of \u00a340 a year\nand free lodging on the premises, his former pupil at the Working Men's\nCollege, Henry Swan, who had done occasional work for him in drawing and\nengraving. Swan was a Quaker, and a remarkable man in his way;\nenthusiastic in his new vocation, and interested in the social questions\nwhich were being discussed in \"Fors.\" Under his care the Museum remained\nat Walkley, accumulating material in the tiny and hardly accessible\ncottage--being so to speak in embryo, until the way should be clear for\nits removal or enlargement, which took place in 1890.\n\nWhen Ruskin came back on his posting tour of April 1876, he stayed\nagain at Sheffield, to meet a few friends of Swan's--Secularists,\nUnitarians, and Quakers, who professed Communism. They had an interview\n(reported in the Sheffield _Daily Telegraph_, April 28th, 1876), which\nbrought out rather curiously the points of difference between their\nopinions and his. They refused to join the Guild because they would not\npromise obedience, and help in its objects. Ruskin, however, was willing\nto advance theirs. A few weeks afterwards he invited them to choose a\npiece of ground for their Communist experiment. They chose a farm of\nover thirteen acres at Abbeydale, which the Guild bought in 1877 at a\ncost of \u00a32,287 16s.6d. for their use--the communists agreeing to pay the\nmoney back in instalments, without interest, by the end of seven years:\nwhen the farm should be their own.\n\nWhen it was actually in their hands they found that they knew nothing of\nfarming--and besides, were making money at trades they did not really\ncare to abandon. They engaged a man to work the farm for them: and then\nanother. They were told that the land they had chosen was--for farming\npurposes--worthless. Their capital ran short; and they tried to make\nmoney by keeping a tea-garden. The original proposer of the scheme wrote\nto Ruskin, who sent \u00a3100:--the others returned the money. Ruskin\ndeclined to take it back, and began to perceive that the Communists were\ntrifling. They had made no attempt to found the sort of community they\nhad talked about; neither their plans nor his were being carried out. So\nwhen the original proposer and a friend of his named Riley approached\nRuskin again, they found little difficulty in persuading him to try them\nas managers. The rest, finding themselves turned out by Riley, vainly\ndemanded \"explanations\" from Ruskin, who then was drifting into his\nfirst attack of brain fever. So they declined further connection with\nthe farm; the Guild accepted their resignation, and undertook for the\ntime nothing more than to get the land into good condition again.\n\nThis was not the only land held by the St. George's Guild. It acquired\nthe acre of ground on which the Sheffield Museum stood, and a cottage\nwith a couple of acres near Scarborough. Two acres of rock and moor at\nBarmouth had been given by Mrs. Talbot in 1872; and in 1877 Mr. George\nBaker, then Mayor of Birmingham, gave twenty acres of woodland at\nBewdley in Worcestershire, to which at one time Mr. Ruskin thought of\nmoving the museum, before the present building was found for it by the\nSheffield Corporation at Meersbrook Park. On the resignation of the\noriginal Trustees, in 1877, Mr. Q. Talbot and Mr. Baker were offered the\ntrust: and on the death of Mr. Talbot the trust was accepted by Mr. John\nHenry Chamberlain. After he died it was taken by Mr. George Thomson of\nHuddersfield, whose woollen mills, transformed into a co-operative\nconcern, though not directly in connection with the Guild, have given a\nwidely known example of the working of principles advocated in \"Fors.\"\n\nIn the middle of 1876, Egbert Rydings, the auditor of the accounts\nwhich, in accordance with his principles of \"glass pockets,\" Ruskin\npublished in \"Fors,\" proposed to start a homespun woollen industry at\nLaxey, in the Isle of Man, where the old women who formerly spun with\nthe wheel had been driven by failure of custom to work in the mines. The\nGuild built him a water mill, and in a few years the demand for a pure,\nrough, durable cloth, created by this and kindred attempts, justified\nthe enterprise. Ruskin set the example, and had his own grey clothes\nmade of Laxey stuffs--whose chief drawback was that they never wore out.\nA little later a similar work was done, with even greater success, by\nMr. Albert Fleming, another member of the Guild; who introduced\nold-fashioned spinning and hand-loom weaving at Langdale.\n\nThe story of Ruskin's posting tour was told many years afterwards, at\nthe opening of the new Sheffield museum, by Mr. Arthur Severn, a famous\n_raconteur_, whose description of the adventures of their cruise upon\nwheels includes so bright a picture of Ruskin, that I must use his words\nas they were reported on the occasion in the magazine _Igdrasil_:\n\n\n     \"... With the Professor, who dislikes railways very much, it was\n     not a question of travelling by rail. He said, 'I will take you in\n     a carriage and with horses, and we will drive the whole way from\n     London to the North of England. And I will not only do that, but I\n     will do the best in my power to get a postilion to ride, and we\n     will go quite in the old-fashioned way ...' The Professor went so\n     far that he actually built a carriage for this drive. It was a\n     regular posting carriage, with good strong wheels, a place behind\n     for the luggage, and cunning drawers inside it for all kinds of\n     things that we might require on the journey. We started off one\n     fine morning from London--I must say without a postilion--but when\n     we arrived at the next town, about twenty miles off, having\n     telegraphed beforehand that we were coming, there was a gorgeous\n     postilion ready with the fresh horses, and we started off in a\n     right style, according to the Professor's wishes.\n\n     \"After many pleasant days of travelling, we at last arrived at\n     Sheffield, and I well remember that we created no small sensation\n     as we clattered up to the old posting inn. I think it was the\n     King's Head. We stayed a few days, and visited the old Museum at\n     Walkley; and I remember the look of regret on the Professor's face\n     when he saw how cramped the space was there for the things he had\n     to show. However, with his usual kindliness, he did not say much\n     about it at the time, and he did not complain of the considerable\n     amount of room it was necessary for the curator and his family to\n     take up in that place. We stayed about two days looking at the\n     beautiful country,--and I am glad to say there was a good deal\n     still left,--and then the Professor gave orders that the carriage\n     should be got ready to take us on our journey, and that a postilion\n     should be forthcoming, if possible. I remember leaving the luncheon\n     table and going outside to see if the necessary arrangements were\n     complete. Sure enough, there was the carriage at the door, and a\n     still more gorgeous postilion than any we had had so far on our\n     journey. His riding breeches were of the tightest and whitest I\n     ever saw; his horses were an admirable pair, and looked like going.\n     A very large crowd had assembled outside the inn, to see what\n     extraordinary kind of mortals could be going to travel in such a\n     way.\n\n     \"I went to the room where the Professor was still at luncheon, and\n     told him that everything was ready, but that there was a very large\n     crowd at the door. He seemed rather amused; and I said, 'You know,\n     Professor, I really don't know what the people expect--whether it\n     is a bride and bridegroom, or what.' He said, 'Well, Arthur, you\n     and Joan shall play at being bride and bridegroom inside the\n     carriage, and I will get on the box.' He got Mrs. Severn on his\n     arm, and had to hold her pretty tightly as he left the door,\n     because when she saw the crowd outside she tried to beat a retreat.\n     At last he got her into the carriage, I was put in afterwards, and\n     he jumped up on the box. The crowd closed in, and looked at us as\n     if we were a sort of menagerie. I was much amused when I thought\n     how little these eager people knew that the real attraction was on\n     the box; I felt inclined to put my head out of the window, and say,\n     'My good people, there is the man you should look at,--not us.' I\n     did not like to do so; and the Professor gave the word to be off,\n     the postilion cracked his whip, and we went off in grand style,\n     amidst the cheers of the crowd....\"\n\nOn one of these posting excursions, they came to Hardraw; Mrs. Alfred\nHunt tells the story in her edition of Turner's \"Richmondshire\"; Mr.\nSevern's account is somewhat different. After examining the Fall, Mrs.\nSevern and Mr. Ruskin left Mr. Severn to sketch, and went away to Hawes\nto order their tea. When they were gone, a man who had been standing by\ncame up and asked if that were Professor Ruskin. \"Yes,\" said Mr. Severn,\n\"it was; he is very fond of the Fall, and much puzzled to know why the\nedge of the cliff is not worn away by the water, as he expected to find\nit after so many years.\" \"Oh,\" said the other, \"there are twelve feet of\nmasonry up there to protect the rock. I'm a native of the place, and\nknow all about it.\" \"I wish,\" said Mr. Severn, absently, as he went on\ndrawing, \"Mr. Ruskin knew that; he would be so interested.\" And the\nstranger ran off. When the sketcher came in to tea he felt there was\nsomething wrong. \"You're in for it!\" said his wife. \"Let us look at his\nsketch first,\" said Mr. Ruskin; and luckily it was a very good one. By\nand by it all came out;--how the Yorkshireman had caught the Professor,\nand eagerly described the horrible Vandalism, receiving in reply some\nvery emphatic language. Upon which he took off his hat and bowed low:\n\"But, sir,\" he faltered, \"the gentleman up there said I was to tell you,\nand you would be so interested!\" The Professor, suddenly mollified, took\noff his hat in turn, and apologised for his reception of the news:\n\"but,\" said he, \"I shall never care for Hardraw Waterfall again.\"\n\n\"The Professor,\" said Mr. Severn, \"dislikes railways very much:\" and on\nhis arrival at Brantwood after that posting journey he wrote a preface\nto \"A Protest against the Extension of Railways in the Lake District,\"\nby Mr. Robert Somervell. Ruskin's dislike of railways has been the text\nof a great deal of misrepresentation, and his use of them, at all, has\nbeen often quoted as an inconsistency. As a matter of fact, he never\nobjected to main lines of railway communication; but he strongly\nobjected, in common with a vast number of people, to the introduction of\nrailways into districts whose chief interest is in their scenery;\nespecially where, as in the English Lake district, the scenery is in\nminiature, easily spoiled by embankments and viaducts, and by the rows\nof ugly buildings which usually grow up round a station; and where the\nbeauty of the landscape can only be felt in quiet walks or drives\nthrough it. Many years later, after he had said all he had to say on the\nsubject again and again, and was on the brink of one of his illnesses,\nhe wrote in violent language to a correspondent who tried to \"draw\" him\non the subject of another proposed railway to Ambleside. But his real\nopinions were simple enough, and consistent with a practicable scheme of\nlife.\n\nIn August 1876 he left England for Italy. He travelled alone,\naccompanied only by his new servant Baxter, who had lately taken the\nplace vacated by Crawley, Mr. Ruskin's former valet of twenty years'\nservice. He crossed the Simplon to Venice, where he was welcomed by an\nold friend, Rawdon Brown, and a new friend, Prof. C.H. Moore, of\nHarvard. He met two Oxford pupils, Mr. J. Reddie Anderson, whom he set\nto work on Carpaccio; and Mr. Whitehead--\"So much nicer they all are,\" he\nwrote in a private letter, \"than I was at their age;\"--also his pupil\nMr. Bunney, at work on copies of pictures and records of architecture,\nthe legacy of St. Mark to St. George. Two young artists were brought\ninto his circle, during that winter--both Venetians, and both singularly\ninteresting men: Giacomo Boni, now a celebrated antiquary, then capo\nd'opera of the Ducal Palace, and doing his best to preserve, instead of\n\"restoring,\" the ancient sculptures; and Angelo Alessandri, a painter of\nmore than usual seriousness of aim and sympathy with the fine qualities\nof the old masters.\n\nRuskin had been engaged on a manual of drawing for his Oxford schools,\nwhich he now meant to complete in two parts: \"The Laws of\nF\u00e9sole\"--teaching the principles of Florentine draughtsmanship; and \"The\nLaws of Rivo Alto\"--about Venetian colour. Passages for this second part\nwere written. But he found himself so deeply interested in the evolution\nof Venetian art, and in tracing the spirit of the people as shown by the\nmythology illustrated in the pictures and sculptures, that his practical\nmanual became a sketch of art history, \"St. Mark's Rest\"--as a sort of\ncompanion to \"Mornings in Florence,\" which he had been working at during\nhis last visit to Italy. His intention was to supersede \"Stones of\nVenice\" by a smaller book, giving more prominence to the ethical side of\nhistory, which should illustrate Carpaccio as the most important figure\nof the transition period, and do away with the exclusive Protestantism\nof his earlier work.\n\nHe set himself to this task, with Tintoret's motto--_Sempre si fa il\nmare maggiore_, and worked with feverish energy, recording his progress\nin letters home.\n\n\"13 _Nov_.--I never was yet, in my life, in such a state of hopeless\nconfusion of letters, drawings, and work: chiefly because, of course,\nwhen one is old, one's _done_ work seems all to tumble in upon one, and\nwant rearranging, and everything brings a thousand old as well as new\nthoughts. My head seems less capable of accounts every year. I can't\n_fix_ my mind on a sum in addition--it goes off, between seven and nine,\ninto a speculation on the seven deadly sins or the nine muses. My table\nis heaped with unanswered letters,--MS. of four or five different books\nat six or seven different parts of each,--sketches getting rubbed\nout,--others getting smudged in,--parcels from Mr. Brown unopened,\nparcels _for_ Mr. Moore unsent; my inkstand in one place,--too probably\nupset,--my pen in another; my paper under a pile of books, and my last\ncarefully written note thrown into the waste-paper basket.\n\n\"3 _Dec_.--I'm having nasty foggy weather just now,--but it's better\nthan fog in London,--and I'm really resting a little, and trying not to\nbe so jealous of the flying days. I've a most _cumfy_ room [at the Grand\nHotel]--I've gone out of the very expensive one, and only pay twelve\nfrancs a day; and I've two windows, one with open balcony and the other\ncovered in with glass. It spoils the look of the window dreadfully, but\ngives me a view right away to Lido, and of the whole sunrise. Then the\nbed is curtained off from rest of room like that [sketch of window and\nroom] with fine flourishing white and gold pillars--and the black place\nis where one goes out of the room beside the bed.\n\n\"9 _Dec_.--I hope to send home a sketch or two which will show I'm not\nquite losing my head yet.... I must show at Oxford some reason for my\nstaying so long in Venice.\"\n\nBeside studies in the Chapel of St. George, he copied Carpaccio's \"Dream\nof St. Ursula\" which was taken down--it had been \"skied\" at the Academy\nuntil then--and placed in the sculpture gallery; and be laboured to\nproduce a facsimile.\n\n\"24 _Dec_.--I do think St. Ursula's lips are coming pretty--and her\neyelids--but oh me, her hair. Toni, Mr. Brown's gondolier, says she's\nall right--and he's a grave and close looking judge, you know.\"\n\nChristmas Day was a crisis in his life. He was attacked by illness;\nsevere pain, followed by a dreamy state in which the vividly realized\npresence of St. Ursula mingled with memories of his dead lady, whose\n\"spirit\" had been shown him a year before by a \"medium\" met at a country\nhouse. Since then he had watched eagerly for evidences of another life:\nand the sense of its conceivability grew upon him, in spite of the\ndoubts which he had entertained of the immortality of the soul. At last,\nafter a year's earnest desire for some such assurance, it seemed to come\nto him. What others call coincidences, and accidents, and states of mind\nflashed, for him, into importance; times and seasons, names and symbols,\ntook a vivid meaning. His intense despondency changed for a while into a\nsingular happiness--it seemed a renewed health and strength: and instead\nof despair, he rejoiced in the conviction of guarding Providences and\nhelpful influences.\n\nReaders of \"Fors\" had traced for some years back the re-awakening of a\nreligious tone, now culminating in a pronounced mysticism which they\ncould not understand, and in a recantation of the sceptical judgments of\nhis middle period. He found, now, new excellences in the early Christian\npainting; he depreciated Turner and Tintoret, and denounced the\nfrivolous art of the day. He searched the Bible more diligently than\never for its hidden meanings; and in proportion as he felt its\ninspiration, he recoiled from the conclusions of modern science, and\nwrapped the prophet's mantle more closely round him, as he denounced\nwith growing fervour the crimes of our unbelieving age.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nDEUCALION AND PROSERPINA (1877-1879)\n\n\nIn the summer of 1875, Ruskin had written:\n\n\n     \"I begin to ask myself, with somewhat pressing arithmetic, how much\n     time is likely to be left me, at the age of fifty-six, to complete\n     the various designs for which, until past fifty, I was merely\n     collecting material. Of these materials I have now enough by me for\n     a most interesting (in my own opinion) history of fifteenth century\n     Florentine Art, in six octavo volumes; an analysis of the Attic art\n     of the fifth century B.C. in three volumes; an exhaustive history\n     of northern thirteenth-century art, in ten volumes; a life of Sir\n     Walter Scott, with analysis of modern epic art, in seven volumes; a\n     life of Xenophon, with analysis of the general principles of\n     education, in ten volumes; a commentary on Hesiod, with final\n     analysis of the principles of Political Economy, in nine volumes;\n     and a general description of the geology and botany of the Alps, in\n     twenty-four volumes.\"\n\nThe estimate of volumes was--perhaps--in jest; but the plans for\nharvesting his material were in earnest.\n\n\"Proserpina\"--so named from the Flora of the Greeks, the daughter of\nDemeter, Mother Earth--grew out of notes already begun in 1866. It was\nlittle like an ordinary botany book;--that was to be expected. It did\nnot dissect plants; it did not give chemical or histological analysis:\nbut with bright and curious fancy, with the most ingenious diagrams and\nperfect drawings--beautifully engraved by Burgess and Allen--illustrated\nthe mystery of growth in plants and the tender beauty of their form.\nThough this was not science, in strict terms it was a field of work\nwhich no one but Ruskin had cultivated. He was helped by a few\nscientific men like Professor Oliver, who saw a value in his line of\nthought, and showed a kindly interest in it.\n\n\"Deucalion\"--from the mythical creator of human life out of stones--was\nbegun as a companion work: to be published in parts, as the repertory\nof Oxford lectures on Alpine form, and notes on all kinds of kindred\nsubjects. For instance, before that hasty journey to Sheffield he gave a\nlecture at the London Institution on \"Precious Stones\" (February 17th,\nrepeated March 28th, 1876. A lecture on a similar subject was given to\nthe boys of Christ's Hospital on April 15th). This lecture, called \"The\nIris of the Earth,\" stood first in Part III. of \"Deucalion\": and the\nwork went on, in studies of the forms of silica, on the lines marked out\nten years before in the papers on Banded and Brecciated Concretions; now\ncarried forward with much kind help from the Rev. J. Clifton Ward, of\nthe Geological Survey, and Mr. Henry Willett, F.G.S., of Brighton.\n\nOn the way home over the Simplon in May and June, 1877, travelling first\nwith Signor Alessandri, and then with Mr. G. Allen, Professor Ruskin\ncontinued his studies of Alpine flowers for \"Proserpina.\" In the autumn\nhe gave a lecture at Kendal (Oct. 1st, repeated at Eton College Dec.\n8th) on \"Yewdale and its Streamlets.\"\n\n\"Yewdale\"--reprinted as Part V. of \"Deucalion\"--took an unusual\nimportance in his own mind, not only because it was a great success as a\nlecture--though some Kendalians complained that there was not enough\n\"information\" in it:--but because it was the first given since that\nChristmas at Venice, when a new insight had been granted him, as he\nfelt, into spiritual things, and a new burden laid on him, to withstand\nthe rash conclusions of \"science falsely so called,\" and to preach in\ntheir place the presence of God in nature and in man.\n\nWriting to Miss Beever about his Oxford course of that autumn, \"Readings\nin Modern Painters,\" [38] he said, on the 2nd December:\n\n[Footnote 38: Nov. 6, 8, 10, 13, 15, 17, 20, 22, 24, 27, 29 and Dec. 1,\n1877. These lectures were never prepared for publication as a course;\nthe last lecture was printed in the _Nineteenth Century_ for January,\n1878.]\n\n\"I gave yesterday the twelfth and last of my course of lectures this\nterm, to a room crowded by six hundred people, two-thirds members of the\nUniversity, and with its door wedged open by those who could not get in;\nthis interest of theirs being granted to me, I doubt not, because for\nthe first time in Oxford I have been able to speak to them boldly of\nimmortal life. I intended when I began the course only to have read\n'Modern Painters' to them; but when I began, some of your favourite\nbits[39] interested the men so much, and brought so much larger a\nproportion of undergraduates than usual, that I took pains to re-inforce\nand press them home; and people say I have never given so useful a\ncourse yet. But it has taken all my time and strength.\"\n\n[Footnote 39: Miss Beever had published early in 1875 the extracts from\n\"Modern Painters,\" so widely known as \"Frondes Agrestes.\"]\n\nHe wrote again, on Dec. 16th, from Herne Hill:\n\n\n     \"It is a long while since I've felt so good-for-nothing as I do\n     this morning. My very wristbands curl up in a dog's-eared and\n     disconsolate manner; my little room is all a heap of disorder. I've\n     got a hoarseness and wheezing and sneezing and coughing and\n     choking. I can't speak and I can't think; I'm miserable in bed and\n     useless out of it; and it seems to me as if I could never venture\n     to open a window or go out of a door any more. I have the dimmest\n     sort of diabolical pleasure in thinking how miserable I shall make\n     Susie by telling her all this; but in other respects I seem\n     entirely devoid of all moral sentiments. I have arrived at this\n     state of things, first by catching cold, and since trying to 'amuse\n     myself' for three days.\"\n\nHe goes on to give a list of his amusements--Pickwick, chivalric\nromances, the _Daily Telegraph_, Staunton's games of chess, and finally\nanalysis of the Dock Company's bill of charges on a box from Venice.\n\nTen days after he wrote from Oxford, in his whimsical style:\n\n\n     \"Yesterday I had two lovely services in my own cathedral. You know\n     the _Cathedral_ of Oxford is the chapel of Christ Church College,\n     and I have my high seat in the chancel, as an honorary student,\n     besides being bred there, and so one is ever so proud and ever so\n     pious all at once, which is ever so nice you know: and my own dean,\n     that's the Dean of Christ Church, who is as big as any bishop, read\n     the services, and the psalms and anthems were lovely; and then I\n     dined with Henry Acland and his family ... but I do wish I could be\n     at Brantwood too.\" Next day it was \"Cold quite gone.\"\n\nBut he was not to be quit so easily this time of the results of overwork\nand worry.\n\nHe had been passing through the unpleasant experience of a\nmisunderstanding with one of his most trusted friends and helpers. His\nwork on behalf of the St. George's Guild had been energetic and sincere:\nand he had received the support of a number of strangers, among whom\nwere people of responsible station and position. But he was surprised to\nfind that many of his personal friends held aloof. He was still more\nsurprised to learn, on returning from Venice, full of new hope and\nstronger convictions in his mission, that the caution of one upon whom\nhe had counted as a firm ally had dissuaded an intending adherent from\njoining in the work. A man of the world, accustomed to overreach and to\nbe overreached, would have taken the discovery coolly, and accepted an\nexplanation. But Ruskin was never a man of the world; and now, much less\nthan ever. He took it as treason to the great work of which he felt\nhimself to be the missionary. Throughout the autumn and winter the\ndiscovery rankled, and preyed on his mind. As for the sake of absolute\ncandour he had published in \"Fors\" everything that related to the Guild\nwork,--even his own private affairs and confessions, whatever they\nrisked,--he felt that this too must out; in order that his supporters\nmight judge of his conduct and that nothing affecting the enterprise\nmight be kept back. And so, at Christmas, he sent the correspondence to\nhis printers.\n\nYears afterwards, by the intervention of friends, this breach was\nhealed: but what suffering it cost can be learnt from the sequel. To\nRuskin it was the beginning of the end. His Aberdeen correspondent asked\njust then for the usual Christmas message to the Bible class: and\ninstead of the cheery words of bygone years, received the couplet from\nHorace:\n\n    \"Inter spem curamque, timores inter et iras,\n    _Omnem_ crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum.\"\n\n\n    \"Amid hope and sorrow, amid fear and wrath, believe\n    _every_ day that has dawned on thee to be thy last.\"\n\nFrom Oxford, early in January, 1878, he went on a visit to Windsor\nCastle, whence he wrote: \"I came to see Prince Leopold, who has been a\nprisoner to his sofa lately, but I trust he is better; he is very bright\nand gentle under severe and almost continual pain.\" No less gentle, in\nspite of the severe justice he was inflicting upon himself even more\nthan upon his friend, was the author of \"Fors,\" as the letters of the\ntime to his invalid neighbour in \"Hortus Inclusus\" show. How ready to\nown himself in the wrong,--at that very moment when he was being pointed\nat as the most obstinate and egotistic of men--how placable he really\nwas and open to rebuke, he showed, when, from Windsor, he went to\nHawarden. Nearly three years before he had written roughly of Mr.\nGladstone; as a Conservative, he was not predisposed in favour of the\nleader of the party to whom he attributed most of the evils he was\ncombating. Mr. Gladstone and he had often met, and by no means agreed\ntogether in conversation. But this visit convinced him that he had\nmisjudged Mr. Gladstone; and he promptly made the fullest apology in the\ncurrent number of \"Fors,\" saying that he had written under a complete\nmisconception of his character. In reprinting the old pages he not only\ncancelled the offending passage, but he left the place blank, with a\nnote in the middle of it, as \"a memorial of rash judgment.\"\n\nHe went slowly northward, seeking rest at Ingleton; whence he wrote,\nJanuary 17:--\"I've got nothing done all the time I've been away but a\nfew mathematical figures [crystallography, no doubt, for 'Deucalion,']\nand the less I do the less I find I can do it; and yesterday, for the\nfirst time these twenty years, I hadn't so much as a 'plan' in my head\nall day.\" Arrived at Brantwood, as rest was useless, he tried work. Mr.\nWillett had asked him to reprint \"The Two Paths,\" and he got that ready\nfor press, and wrote a short preface. At Venice, Mr. J.R. Anderson had\nbeen working out for him the myths illustrated by Carpaccio in the\nChapel of S. Giorgio de' Schiavoni; and the book had been waiting for\nRuskin's introduction until he was surprised by the publication of an\nalmost identical inquiry by M. Clermont-Ganneau. He tried to fulfil his\nduty to his pupil by writing the preface immediately; most sorrowfully\nfeeling the inadequacy of his strength for the tasks he had laid upon\nit. He wrote:\n\n\n     \"My own feeling, now, is that everything which has hitherto\n     happened to me, and been done by me, whether well or ill, has been\n     fitting me to take greater fortune more prudently, and to do better\n     work more thoroughly. And just when I seem to be coming out of\n     school,--very sorry to have been such a foolish boy, yet having\n     taken a prize or two, and expecting now to enter upon some more\n     serious business than cricket,--I am dismissed by the Master I\n     hoped to serve, with a--'That's all I want of you, sir.'\"\n\nIn such times he found relief by reverting to the past. He wrote in the\nbeginning of February a paper for the _University Magazine_ on \"My First\nEditor,\" W.H. Harrison, and forgot himself--almost--in bright\nreminiscences of youthful days and early associations. Next, as Mr.\nMarcus Huish, who had shown great friendliness and generosity in\nproviding prints for the Sheffield museum, was now proposing to hold an\nExhibition of Mr. Ruskin's \"Turners\" at the Fine Art Galleries in New\nBond Street, it was necessary to arrange the exhibits and to prepare the\ncatalogue. For the next fortnight he struggled on with this labour, and\nwith his last \"Fors\"--the last he was to write in the long series of\nmore than seven years.[40] How little the thousands who read the preface\nto his catalogue, with its sad sketch of Turner's fate, and what they\nsupposed to be its \"customary burst of terminal eloquence,\" understood\nthat it was indeed the cry of one who had been wounded in the house of\nhis friends, and was now believing every day that dawned on him to be\nhis last. He told of Turner's youthful picture of the Coniston Fells and\nits invocation to the mists of morning, bidding them \"in honour to the\nworld's great Author, rise,\"--and then how Turner's \"health, and with it\nin great degree his mind, failed suddenly with a snap of some vital\nchord,\" after the sunset splendours of his last, dazzling efforts....\n\n[Footnote 40: \"Fors\" was taken up again, at intervals, later on; but\nnever with the same purpose and continuity.]\n\n\"Morning breaks, as I write, along those Coniston Fells, and the level\nmists, motionless and grey beneath the rose of the moorlands, veil the\nlower woods, and the sleeping village, and the long lawns by the\nlake-shore. Oh that some one had but told me, in my youth, when all my\nheart seemed to be set on these colours and clouds, that appear for a\nlittle while and then vanish away, how little my love of them would\nserve me, when the silence of lawn and wood in the dews of morning\nshould be completed; and all my thoughts should be of those whom, by\nneither, I was to meet more!\"\n\nThe catalogue was finished, and hurried off to the printers. A week of\nagitating suspense at home, and then it could no longer be concealed.\nFriends and foes alike were startled and saddened with the news of his\n\"sudden and dangerous illness,\"--some form of inflammation of the\nbrain--the result of overwork, but still more immediately of the\nemotional strain from which he had been suffering.\n\nOn March 4th, the Turner Exhibition opened, and day by day the bulletins\nfrom Brantwood announcing his condition were read by multitudes of\nvisitors with eager and sorrowful interest. Newspapers all the world\nover copied the daily reports: in the Far West of America the same\ntelegrams were posted, and they say even a more demonstrative sympathy\nwas shown. Nor was the feeling confined to the English speaking public.\nThe Oxford Proctor in Convocation of April 24th, when the patient, after\nthe first burst of the storm was slowly drifting back into calmer\nwaters, thought it worth while, in the course of his speech, to mention\nthat in Italy, where he had lately been on an Easter vacation tour, he\nhad witnessed a widespread anxiety about Ruskin, and prayers put up for\nhis recovery.\n\nBy May 10th he was so much better that he could complete the catalogue\nwith some gossip about those Alpine drawings of 1842 which he regarded\nas the climax of Turner's work. The first--and best in some ways--of the\nseries was the Spl\u00fcgen. Without any word to him, the diligence of kind\nfriends and the help of a wide circle of admirers traced the drawing,\nand subscribed its price--1,000 guineas, to which Mr. Agnew generously\nadded his commission--and it was presented to Mr. Ruskin as a token of\nsympathy and respect. He was not insensible to the personal compliment\nimplied, and by way of some answer he spent the first few days of his\nconvalescence in arranging and annotating a series of drawings by\nhimself, and engravings, illustrating the Turners, to add to his show\nduring the remainder of the season. When they were sent off (early in\nJune) to Bond Street, he left home with the Severns to complete his\nrecovery at Malham.\n\nThere was another reason why that spontaneous testimonial was welcome at\nthe moment, for a curious and unaccustomed ordeal was impending for his\nclaims as an art critic. On his return from Venice after months of\nintercourse with the great Old Masters, he found the Grosvenor Gallery\njust opened for the first time, with its memorable exhibition of the\ndifferent extra-academical schools. It placed before the public, in\nsharp contrast, the final outcome of the Pre-Raphaelitism for which he\nhad fought many a year before, and samples of the last new fashion from\nParis. The maturer works of Burne-Jones had been practically unseen by\nthe public, and Ruskin took the opportunity of their exhibition to write\nhis praise of the youngest of the Old Masters in the current numbers of\n\"Fors,\" and afterwards in two papers on the \"Three Colours of\nPre-Raphaelitism\" (_Nineteenth Century Magazine_, November and December,\n1878). But in the same \"Fors\" he dismissed with half a paragraph of\ncontempt Mr. Whistler's eccentric sketch of Fireworks at Cremorne. Long\nbefore, in 1863, when he was working with various artists connected with\nthe Pre-Raphaelite circle, Mr. Whistler had made overtures to the great\ncritic through Mr. Swinburne the poet; but he had not been taken\nseriously. Now he had become the missionary in England of the new French\ngospel of \"impressionism,\" which to Ruskin was one of those half-truths\nwhich are ever the worst of heresies. Mr. Whistler appealed to the law.\nHe brought an action for libel, which was tried on November 25th and\n26th before Baron Huddleston, and recovered a farthing damages. Ruskin's\ncosts--amounting to \u00a3386 12s. 4d.--were paid by a public subscription to\nwhich one hundred and twenty persons, including many strangers,\ncontributed.\n\nBy that time he was fully recovering from his illness, back at Coniston,\nafter a short visit to Liverpool. It was forbidden to him to attempt any\nexciting work. He had given up \"Fors\" and Oxford lecturing, and was\ndevoting himself again to quiet studies for \"Proserpina\" and\n\"Deucalion.\" On the first day of the trial the St. George's Guild was\nregistered as a Company; on the second day he wrote to Miss Beever:\n\n\n     \"I have entirely resigned all hope of ever thanking you rightly for\n     bread, sweet odours, roses and pearls, and must just allow myself\n     to be fed, scented, rose-garlanded and be-pearled, as if I were a\n     poor little pet dog, or pet pig. But my cold is better, and I _am_\n     getting on with this botany; but it is really too important a work\n     to be pushed for a week or fortnight.\"\n\nEarly in 1879 his resignation of the Slade Professorship was announced;\nfollowed by what was virtually his election to an honorary doctor's\ndegree; or, as officially worded--\"the Hebdomadal Council resolved on\nJune 9, 1879, to propose to Convocation to confer the degree of D.C.L.\n_honoris causa_ upon John Ruskin, M.A., of Ch. Ch., at the en\u00e6nia of\nthat year; but the proposal, though notified in the _Gazette_ of June\n10, was not submitted to vote owing to the inability of Mr. Ruskin to be\npresent at the enc\u00e6nia.\" The degree was conferred, in his absence, in\n1893.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nTHE DIVERSIONS OF BRANTWOOD (1879-1881)\n\n\nSixty years of one of the busiest lives on record were beginning to tell\nupon Ruskin. He would not confess to old age, but his recent illness had\nshaken him severely. The next three years were spent chiefly at\nConiston, in comparative retirement; but neither in despair, nor\nidleness, nor loneliness. He had always lived a sort of dual life,\nsolitary in his thoughts, but social in his habits; liking company,\nespecially of young people; ready, in the intervals of work, to enter\ninto their employments and amusements, and curiously able to forget his\ncares in hours of relaxation. Sometimes, when earnest admirers made the\npilgrimage to their Mecca--\"holy Brantwood\" as a scoffing poet called\nit--they were surprised and even shocked, to find the prophet of \"Fors\"\nat the head of a merry dinner-table, and the Professor of Art among\nsurroundings which a London or a Boston \"\u00e6sthete\" would have ruled to\nbe in very poor taste.\n\nShall I take you for a visit there,--to Brantwood as it was in those old\ntimes?\n\nIt is a weary way to Coniston, whatever road you choose. The\ninconvenience of the railway route was perhaps one reason of Ruskin's\npreference for driving on so many occasions. After changing and changing\ntrains, and stopping at many a roadside station, at last you see,\nsuddenly, over the wild undulating country, the Coniston Old Man and its\ncrags, abrupt on the left, and the lake, long and narrow, on the right.\nAcross the water, tiny in the distance and quite alone amongst forests\nand moors, there is Brantwood; and beyond it everything seems\nuncultivated, uninhabited, except for one grey farmhouse high on the\nfell, where gaps in the ragged larches show how bleak and storm-swept a\nspot it is.\n\nTo come out of the station after long travel is to find yourself face to\nface with magnificent rocks, and white cottages among the fir-trees. As\nyou are whirled down through the straggling village, and along the shore\nround the head of the lake, the panorama, though not Alpine in\nmagnitude, is almost Alpine in character. The valley, too, is not yet\nbuilt up; it is still the old-fashioned lake country, almost as it was\nin the days of the \"Iteriad.\" You drive up and down a narrow, hilly\nlane, catching peeps of mountains and sunset, through thick, overhanging\ntrees; you turn sharp up through a gate under dark firs and larches, and\nthe carriage stops in what seems in the twilight a sort of court,--a\ngravelled space, one side formed by a rough stone wall crowned with\nlaurels and almost precipitous coppice, the _brant_ (or steep) wood\nabove, and the rest is Brantwood, with a capital B.[41]\n\n[Footnote 41: The archway supporting a great pile of new buildings did\nnot exist in the time when this visit is supposed to be made. Since that\ntime new stables and greenhouses also have been built; with other\nadditions somewhat altering the cottage-like house of Ruskin's working\ndays.]\n\nYou expect that Gothic porch you have read of in \"Lectures on\nArchitecture and Painting,\" and you are surprised to find a stucco\nclassic portico in the corner, painted and _grained_, and heaped around\nwith lucky horseshoes, brightly blackleaded, and mysterious rows of\nlarge blocks of slate and basalt and trap--a complete museum of local\ngeology, if only you knew it--very unlike an ideal entrance; still more\nunlike an ordinary one. While you wait you can see through the glass\ndoor a roomy hall, lit with candles, and hung with large drawings by\nBurne-Jones and by the master of the house. His soft hat, and thick\ngloves, and chopper, lying on the marble table, show that he has come in\nfrom his afternoon's woodcutting.\n\nBut if you are expected you will hardly have time to look round, for\nBrantwood is nothing if not hospitable. The honoured guest--and all\nguests are honoured there--after welcome, is ushered up a narrow stair,\nwhich betrays the original cottage, into the \"turret room.\" It had been\n\"the Professor's\" until after his illness, and he papered it with\nnaturalistic pansies, to his own taste, and built out at one corner a\nprojecting turret to command the view on all sides, with windows\nstrongly latticed to resist the storms. There is old-fashioned solid\ncomfort in the way of furniture; and pictures,--a D\u00fcrer engraving, some\nProuts and Turners, a couple of old Venetian heads, and Meissonier's\n\"Napoleon,\" over the fireplace--a picture which Ruskin bought for one\nthousand guineas, showed for a time at Oxford, and hung up here in a\nshabby little frame to be out of the way.[42]\n\n[Footnote 42: Sold in 1882 for 5,900 guineas.]\n\nIf you are a man, you are told not to dress; if you are a lady, you may\nput on your prettiest gown. They dine in the new room, for the old\ndining-room was so small that the waitress could not get round the\ntable. The new room is spacious and lofty compared with the rest of the\nhouse; it has a long window with thick red sandstone mullions--there at\nlast is a touch of Gothicism--to look down the lake, and a bay window\nopen on the narrow lawn sloping steeply down to the road in front, and\nthe view of the Old Man. The walls, painted \"duck egg,\" are hung with\nold pictures; the Doge Gritti, a bit saved from the great Titian that\nwas burnt in the fire at the Ducal Palace in 1574; a couple of\nTintorets; Turner and Reynolds, each painted by himself in youth;\nRaphael by a pupil, so it is said; portraits of old Mr. and Mrs. Ruskin,\nand little John and his \"boo hills.\" There he sits, no longer little,\nopposite: and you can trace the same curve and droop of the eyebrows\nprefigured in the young face and preserved in the old, and a certain\nfamily likeness to his handsome young father.\n\nSince Mr. Ruskin's illness his cousin, Mrs. Arthur Severn, has become\nmore and more indispensable to him: she sits at the head of the table\nand calls him \"the coz.\" An eminent visitor was once put greatly out of\ncountenance by this apparent irreverence. After obvious embarrassment,\nlight dawned upon him towards the close of the meal. \"Oh!\" said he,\n\"it's 'the coz' you call Mr. Ruskin. I thought you were saying' the\ncuss!'\"\n\nThere are generally two or three young people staying in the house,\nsalaried assistants[43] or amateur, occasional helpers; but though there\nis a succession of visitors from a distance, there is not very frequent\nentertainment of neighbours.\n\n[Footnote 43: The face most familiar at Brantwood in those times was\n\"Laurie's.\" A strange, bright, gifted boy--admirable draughtsman,\ningenious mechanician, marvellous actor; the imaginer of the quaintest\nand drollest humours that ever entered the head of man; devoted to boats\nand boating, but unselfishly ready to share all labours and contribute\nto all diversions; painstaking and perfect in his work, and brilliant in\nhis wit,--Laurence Hilliard was dearly loved by his friends, and is\nstill loved by them dearly. He was Ruskin's chief secretary at Brantwood\nfrom Jan., 1876 to 1882, when the death of his father, and ill-health,\nled him to resign the post, which was then filled by Miss Sara D.\nAnderson. Hilliard continued to live at Coniston, and was just beginning\nto succeed as a painter of still life and landscape when he died of\npleurisy on board a friend's yacht in the Aegean, April 11th, 1887, aged\nthirty-two.]\n\nA Brantwood dinner is always ample; there is no asceticism about the\nplace; nor is there any affectation of \"intensity\" or of conversational\ncleverness. The neat things you meant to say are forgotten--you must be\nhardened indeed to say them to Mr. Ruskin's face; but if you were shy,\nyou soon feel that there was no need for shyness; you have fallen among\nfriends; and before dessert comes in, with fine old sherry--the pride of\nyour host, as he explains--you feel that nobody understands you so well,\nand that all his books are nothing to himself.\n\nThey don't sit over their wine, and smoking is not allowed. Ruskin goes\noff to his study after dinner--it is believed for a nap, for he was at\nwork early and has been out all the afternoon. In the drawing-room you\nsee pictures--water-colours by Turner and Hunt, drawings by Prout and\nRuskin, an early Burne-Jones, a sketch in oil by Gainsborough. The\nfurniture is the old mahogany of Mr. Ruskin's childhood, with rare\nthings interspersed--like the cloisonn\u00e9 vases on the mantelpiece.\n\nSoon after nine Ruskin comes in with an armful of things that are going\nto the Sheffield museum, and while his cousin makes his tea and salted\ntoast, he explains his last acquirements in minerals or missals, eager\nthat you should see the interest of them; or displays the last studies\nof Mr. Rooke or Mr. Fairfax Murray, copies from Carpaccio or bits of\nGothic architecture.\n\nThen, sitting in the chair in which he preached his baby-sermon, he\nreads aloud a few chapters of Scott or Miss Edgeworth, or, with\njudicious omissions, one of the older novelists; or translates, with\nadmirable facility, a scene of Scribe or George Sand. When his next\nwork comes out you will recognise this evening's reading in his\nallusions and quotations, perhaps even in the subjects of his writing,\nfor at this time he is busy on the articles of \"Fiction, Fair and Foul.\"\n\nAfter the reading, music; a bit of his own composition, \"Old Aegina's\nRock,\" or \"Cockle-hat and Staff\"; his cousin's Scotch ballads or Christy\nMinstrel songs; and if you can sing a new ditty, fresh from London, now\nis your chance. You are surprised to see the Prophet clapping his hands\nto \"Camptown Races,\" or the \"Hundred Pipers\"--chorus given with the\nwhole strength of the company; but you are in a house of strange\nmeetings.\n\nBy about half-past ten his day is over; a busy day, that has left him\ntired out. You will not easily forget the way he lit his candle--no\nlamps allowed, and no gas--and gave a last look lovingly at a pet\npicture or two, slanting his candlestick and shading the light with his\nhand, before he went slowly upstairs to his own little room, literally\nlined with the Turner drawings you have read about in \"Modern Painters.\"\n\nYou may be waked by a knock at the door, and \"Are you looking out?\" And\npulling up the blind, there is one of our Coniston mornings, with the\nwhole range of mountains in one quiet glow above the cool mist of the\nvalley and lake. Going down at length on a voyage of exploration, and\nturning in perhaps at the first door, you intrude upon \"the Professor\"\nat work in his study, half sitting, half kneeling at his round table in\nthe bay window, with the early cup of coffee, and the cat in his crimson\narm-chair. There he has been working since dawn, perhaps, or on dark\nmornings by candlelight. And he does not seem to mind the interruption;\nafter a welcome he asks you to look round while he finishes his\nparagraph, and writes away composedly.\n\nA long, low room, evidently two old cottage-rooms thrown into one;\npapered with a pattern specially copied from Marco Marziale's\n\"Circumcision\" in the National Gallery; and hung with Turners. A great\nearly Turner[44] of the Lake of Geneva is over the fireplace. You are\ntempted to make a mental inventory. Polished steel fender, very\nun\u00e6sthetic; curious shovel--his design, he will stop to remark, and\nforged by the village smith. Red mahogany furniture, with startling\nshiny emerald leather chair-cushions; red carpet and green curtains.\nMost of the room crowded with bookcases and cabinets for minerals.\nScales in a glass case; heaps of mineral specimens; books on the floor;\nrolls of diagrams; early Greek pots from Cyprus; a great litter of\nthings and yet not disorderly nor dusty. \"I don't understand,\" he once\nsaid, \"why you ladies are always complaining about the dust; my\nbookcases are never dusty!\" The truth being that, though he rose early,\nthe housemaid rose earlier.\n\n[Footnote 44: Since sold, and replaced by a della Robbia Madonna.]\n\nBefore you have finished your inventory he breaks off work to show you a\ndrawer or two of minerals, fairy-land in a cupboard; or some of his\nmissals, King Hakon's Bible, or the original MS. of the Scott he was\nreading last night; or, opening a door in a sort of secr\u00e9taire, pulls\nout of their sliding cases frame after frame of Turners--the Bridge of\nNarni, the Falls of Terni, Florence, or Rome, and many more--to hold in\nyour hand, and take to the light, and look into with a lens--quite a\ndifferent thing from seeing pictures in a gallery.\n\nAt breakfast, when you see the post-bag brought in, you understand why\nhe tries to get his bit of writing done early. The letters and parcels\nare piled in the study, and after breakfast, at which, as in old times,\nhe reads his last-written passages--how much more interesting they will\nalways look to you in print!--after breakfast he is closeted with an\nassistant, and they work through the heap. Private friends, known by\nhandwriting, he puts aside; most of the morning will go in answering\nthem. Business he talks over, and gives brief directions. But the bulk\nof the correspondence is from strangers in all parts of the\nworld--admirers' flattery; students' questions; begging-letters for\nmoney, books, influence, advice, autographs, criticism on enclosed MS.\nor accompanying picture; remonstrance or abuse from dissatisfied\nreaders, or people who object to his method of publication, or wish to\nconvert him to their own religion. And so the heap is gradually cleared,\nwith the help of the waste-paper basket; the secretary's work cut out,\nhis own arranged; and by noon a long row of letters and envelopes have\nbeen set out to dry--Mr. Ruskin uses no blotting-paper, and, as he\ndislikes the vulgar method of fastening envelopes, the secretary's work\nwill be to seal them all with red wax, and the seal with the motto\n\"To-day\" cut in the apex of a big specimen of chalcedony.\n\nIf you take, as many do, an interest in the minuti\u00e6 of portrait\npainting, and think the picture more finished for its details, you may\nnotice that he writes on the flat table, not on a desk; that he uses a\ncork penholder and a fine steel pen, though he is not at all a slave to\nhis tools, and differs from others rather in the absence of the _sine\nqu\u00e2 non_ from his conditions. He can write anywhere, on anything, with\nanything; wants no pen-wiper, no special form of paper, or other \"fad.\"\nMuch of his work is written in bound notebooks, especially when he _is_\nabroad, to prevent the loss and disorder of multitudinous foolscap. He\ngenerally makes a rough syllabus of his subject, in addition to copious\nnotes and extracts from authorities, and then writes straight off; not\nwithout a noticeable hesitation and revision, even in his letters. His\nrough copy is transcribed by an assistant, and he often does not see it\nagain until it is in proof.[45]\n\n[Footnote 45: In later years he sometimes had his copy type-written.]\n\nPrinters' proofs are always a trial, and he is glad to shift the work on\nto an assistant's shoulders, such as Mr. Harrison was, who saw all his\nearly works through the press. But he is extremely particular about\ncertain matters, such as the choice of type and arrangements of the\npage; though his taste does not coincide with that of the leaders of\nrecent fashions. Mr. Jowett (of Messrs. Hazell, Watson & Viney, Limited)\nsaid in _Hazell's Magazine_ for September; 1892, that Ruskin made the\nsize of the page a careful study, though he adopted many varieties. The\n\"Fors\" page is different from, and not so symmetrical as that of the\noctavo \"Works Series,\" although both are printed on the same sized\npaper--medium 8vo. Then there is the \"Knight's Faith\" and \"Ulric,\" in\nboth of which the type (pica _modern_--\"this delightful type,\" wrote\nRuskin) and the size of the page are different from any other; yet both\nwere his choice. The \"Ulric\" page was imitated from an old edition of\nMiss Edgeworth. The first proof he criticised thus: \"Don't you think a\nquarter inch off this page, as enclosed, would look better? The type is\nvery nice. How delicious a bit of Miss Edgeworth's is, like this!\" \"Ida\"\nwas another page of his choice, and greatly approved. His title pages,\ntoo, were arranged with great care; he used to draw them out in pen and\nink, indicating the size and position of the lines and letters. He\nobjected to ornaments and to anything like blackness and heaviness, but\nhe was very particular about proportions and spacing, and about the\ndivision of words.\n\nIn the morning everybody is busy. There are drawings and diagrams to be\nmade, MS. to copy, references to look up, parcels to pack and unpack.\nSomeone is told off to take you round, and you visit the various rooms\nand see the treasures, inspect the outhouse with its workshop for\ncarpentry, framing and mounting, casting leaves and modelling; one work\nor another is sure to be going on; perhaps one of the various sculptors\nwho have made Ruskin's bust is busy there. Down at the Lodge, a\nminiature Brantwood, turret and all, the Severn children live when they\nare at Coniston. Then there are the gardens, terraced in the steep,\nrocky slope, and some small hot-houses, which Ruskin thinks a\nsuperfluity, except that they provide grapes for sick neighbours.\n\nBelow the gardens a path across a field takes you to the harbour, begun\nin play by the Xenophon translators and finished by the village mason,\nwith its fleet of boats--chief of them the \"Jumping Jenny\" (called after\nNanty Ewart's boat in \"Redgauntlet\"), Ruskin's own design and special\nprivate water-carriage. Outside the harbour the sail-boats are moored,\nMr. Severn's _Lily of Brantwood_. Milliard's boat, and his _Snail_, an\nunfortunate craft brought from Morecambe Bay with great expectations\nthat were never realized; though Ruskin always professed to believe in\nher, as a _real sea-boat_ (see \"Harbours of England\") such as he used to\nsteer with his friend Huret, the Boulogne fisherman, in the days when\nhe, too, was smitten with sea-fever.\n\nAfter luncheon, if letters are done, all hands are piped to the moor.\nWith billhooks and choppers the party winds up the wood paths, \"the\nProfessor\" first, walking slowly, and pointing out to you his pet bits\nof rock-cleavage, or ivied trunk, or nest of wild strawberry plants. You\nsee, perhaps, the ice-house--tunnelled at vast expense into the rock and\nfilled at more expense with the best ice; opened at last with great\nexpectations and the most charitable intent--for it was planned to\nsupply invalids in the neighbourhood with ice, as the, hothouses\nsupplied them with grapes; and revealing, after all, nothing but a\npuddle of dirty water. You see more successful works--the Professor's\nlittle private garden, which he is supposed to cultivate with his own\nhands; various little wells and watercourses among the rocks, moss-grown\nand fern-embowered; and so you come out on the moor.\n\nThere great works go on. Juniper is being rooted up; boggy patches\ndrained and cultivated cranberries are being planted, and oats grown;\npaths engineered to the best points of view; rocks bared to examine the\ngeology--though you cannot get the Professor to agree that every inch of\nhis territory has been glaciated. These diversions have their serious\nside, for he is really experimenting on the possibility of reclaiming\nwaste land; perhaps too sanguine, you think, and not counting the cost.\nTo which he replies that, as long as there are hands unemployed and\nmisemployed, a government such as he would see need never be at a loss\nfor labourers. If corn can be made to grow where juniper grew before,\nthe benefit is a positive one, the expense only comparative. And so you\ntake your pick with the rest, and are almost persuaded to become a\ncompanion of St. George.\n\nNot to tire a new comer, he takes you away after a while to a fine\nheathery promontory, where you sit before a most glorious view of lake\nand mountains. This, he says, is his \"Naboth's vineyard\";[46] he would\nlike to own so fine a point of vantage. But he is happy in his country\nretreat, far happier than you thought him; and the secret of his\nhappiness is that he has sympathy with all around him, and hearty\ninterest in everything, from the least to the greatest.\n\n[Footnote 46: Since then become part of the Brantwood estate.]\n\nComing down from the moor after the round, when you reach the front door\nyou must see the performance of the waterfall: everybody must see that.\nOn the moor a reservoir has been dug and dammed, with ingenious\nflood-gates--Ruskin's device, of course--and a channel led down through\nthe wood to a rustic bridge in the rock. Some one has stayed behind to\nlet out the water, and down it comes; first a black stream and then a\nwhite one, as it gradually clears; and the rocky wall at the entrance\nbecomes for ten minutes a cascade. This too has it uses; not only is\nthere a supply of water in case of fire (the exact utilisation of which\nis yet undecided), but it illustrates one of his doctrines about the\nsimplicity with which works of irrigation could be carried out among the\nhills of Italy.\n\nAnd so you go in to tea and chess, for he loves a good game of chess\nwith all his heart. He loves many things, you have found. He is\ndifferent from other men you know, by the breadth and vividness of his\nsympathies, by power of living as few other men can live, in Admiration,\nHope and Love.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\n\"FORS\" RESUMED (1880-1881)\n\n\nRetirement at Brantwood was only partial. Ruskin's habits of life made\nit impossible for him to be idle, much as he acknowledged the need of\nthorough rest. He could not be wholly ignorant of the world outside\nConiston; though sometimes for weeks together he tried to ignore it, and\nrefused to read a newspaper. The time when General Gordon went out to\nKhartoum was one of these periods of abstraction, devoted to medi\u00e6val\nstudy. Somebody talked one morning at breakfast about the Soudan. \"And\nwho _is_ the Soudan?\" he earnestly inquired, connecting the name, as it\nseemed, with the Soldan of Babylon, in crusading romance.\n\n\"Don't you know,\" he wrote to a friend (January 8th, 1880):\n\n\n     \"That I am entirely with you in this Irish misery, and have been\n     these thirty years?--only one can't speak plain without distinctly\n     becoming a leader of Revolution? I know that Revolution _must come_\n     in all the world--but I can't act with Dan ton or Robespierre, nor\n     with the modern French Republican or Italian one. I _could_ with\n     you and your Irish, but you are only at the beginning of the end. I\n     have spoken,--and plainly too,--for all who have ears, and hear.\"\n\nThe author of \"Fors\" had tried to show that the nineteenth-century\ncommercialist spirit was not new; that the tyranny of capital was the\nold sin of usury over again; and he asked why preachers of religion did\nnot denounce it--why, for example, the Bishop of Manchester did not, on\nsimply religious grounds, oppose the teaching of the \"Manchester\nSchool,\" who were the chief supporters of the commercialist economy. Not\nuntil the end of 1879 had Dr. Fraser been aware of the challenge; but at\nlength he wrote, justifying his attitude. The popular and able bishop\nhad much to say on the expediency of the commercial system and the error\nof taking the Bible literally; but he seemed unaware of the revolution\nin economical thought which \"Unto this Last\" and \"Fors\" had been\npioneering.\n\n\"I'm not gone to Venice yet,\" wrote Ruskin to Miss Beever, \"but thinking\nof it hourly. I'm very nearly done with toasting my bishop; he just\nwants another turn or two, and then a little butter.\" The toasting and\nthe buttering appeared in the _Contemporary Review_ for February 1880;\nand this incident led him to feel that the mission of \"Fors\" was not\nfinished. If bishops were still unenlightened, there was yet work to do.\nHe gave up Venice, and resumed his crusade.\n\nBrantwood life was occasionally interrupted by short excursions to\nLondon or elsewhere. In the autumn he had heard Professor Huxley on the\nevolution of reptiles; and this suggested another treatment of the\nsubject, from his own artistic and ethical point of view, in a lecture\noddly called \"A Caution to Snakes,\" given at the London Institution,\nMarch 17th, 1880 (repeated March 23rd, and printed in \"Deucalion\"). He\nwas not merely an amateur zoologist and F.Z.S., but a devoted lover and\nkeen observer of animals. It would take long to tell the story of all\nhis dogs, from the spaniel Dash, commemorated in his earliest poems, and\nWisie, whose sagacity is related in \"Pr\u00e6terita,\" down through the long\nline of bulldogs, St. Bernards, and collies, to Bramble, the reigning\nfavourite; and all the cats who made his study their home, or were\nflirted with abroad. To Miss Beever, from Bolton Abbey (January 24th,\n1875) he describes the Wharfe in flood, and then continues: \"I came home\n(to the hotel) to quiet tea, and a black kitten called Sweep, who lapped\nhalf my cream-jugful (and yet I had plenty), sitting on my shoulder.\"\nGrip, the pet rook at Denmark Hill, is mentioned in \"My First Editor,\"\nas celebrated in verse by Mr. W.H. Harrison.\n\nRuskin had not Thoreau's intimate acquaintance with the details of wild\nlife, but his attitude towards animals and plants was the same; hating\nthe science that murders to dissect; resigning his Professorship at\nOxford, finally, because vivisection was introduced into the University;\nand supporting the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals with\nall his heart. But, as he said at the Annual Meeting in 1877, he\nobjected to the sentimental fiction and exaggerated statements which\nsome of its members circulated. \"They had endeavoured to prevent cruelty\nto animals,\" he said, \"but they had not enough endeavoured to promote\naffection for animals. He trusted to the pets of children for their\neducation, just as much as to their tutors.\"\n\nIt was to carry out this idea (to anticipate a little) that he founded\nthe Society of Friends of Living Creatures, which he addressed, May\n23rd, 1885, at the club, Bedford Park, in his capacity of--not\npresident--but \"papa.\" The members, boys and girls from seven to\nfifteen, promised not to kill nor hurt any animal for sport, nor tease\ncreatures; but to make friends of their pets and watch their habits, and\ncollect facts about natural history.\n\nI remember, on one of the rambles at Coniston in the early days, how we\nfound a wounded buzzard--one of the few creatures of the eagle kind that\nour English mountains still breed. The rest of us were not very ready to\ngo near the beak and talons of the fierce-looking, and, as we supposed,\ndesperate bird. Ruskin quietly took it up in his arms, felt it over to\nfind the hurt, and carried it, quite unresistingly, out of the way of\ndogs and passers-by, to a place where it might die in solitude or\nrecover in safety. He often told his Oxford hearers that he would rather\nthey learned to love birds than to shoot them; and his wood and moor\nwere harbours of refuge for hunted game or \"vermin;\" and his windows the\nrendezvous of the little birds.\n\nHe had not been abroad since the spring of 1877, and in August 1880 felt\nable to travel again. He went for a tour among the northern French\ncathedrals, staying at old haunts,--Abbeville, Amiens, Beauvais,\nChartres, Rouen,--and then returned with Mr. A. Severn and Mr. Brabazon\nto Amiens, where he spent the greater part of October. He was writing a\nnew book--the \"Bible of Amiens\"--which was to be to the \"Seven Lamps\"\nwhat \"St. Mark's Rest\" was to \"Stones of Venice.\"\n\nBefore he returned, the secretary of the Chesterfield Art School had\nwritten to ask him to address the students. Mr. Ruskin, travelling\nwithout a secretary, and in the flush of new work and thronging ideas,\nput the letter aside; he carried his letters about in bundles in his\nportmanteau, as he said in his apology, \"and looked at them as Ulysses\nat the bags of Aeolus.\" Some wag had the impudence to forge a reply,\nwhich was actually read at the meeting in spite of its obviously\nfictitious style and statements:\n\n\n     \"HARLESDEN(!), LONDON, _Friday_.\n\n     \"MY DEAR SIR,\n\n     \"Your letter reaches me here. Have just returned [commercial\n     English, not Ruskin] from Venice [where he had meant to go, but did\n     not go] where I have ruminated(!) in the pasturages of the home of\n     art(!); the loveliest and holiest of lovely and holy cities, where\n     the very stones cry out, eloquent in the elegancies of\n     iambics\" (!!)--and so forth.\n\nHowever, it deceived the newspapers, and there was a fine storm, which\nMr. Ruskin rather enjoyed. For though the forgery was clumsy enough, it\nembodied some apt plagiarism from a letter to the Mansfield Art School\non a similar occasion.\n\nNot long before, a forgery of a more serious kind had been committed by\none of the people connected with St. George's Guild, who had put Mr.\nRuskin's name to cheques. The bank authorities were long in tracing the\ncrime. They even sent a detective to Brantwood to watch one of the\nassistants, who never knew--nor will ever know--that he was honoured\nwith such attentions; and none of his friends for a moment believed him\nguilty. He had sometimes imitated Mr. Ruskin's hand; a dangerous jest.\nThe real culprit was discovered at last, and Mr. Ruskin had to go to\nLondon as a witness for the prosecution. \"Being in very weak health,\"\nthe _Times_ report said (April 1st, 1879), \"he was allowed to give\nevidence from the bench.\" He had told the Sheffield communists that \"he\nthought so strongly on the subject of the repression of crime that he\ndare not give expression to his ideas for fear of being charged with\ncruelty\"; but no sooner was the prisoner released than he gave the help\nneeded to start him again in a better career.\n\nThough he did not feel able to lecture to strangers at Chesterfield, he\nvisited old friends at Eton, on November 6th, 1880, to give an address\non Amiens. For once he forgot his MS., but the lecture was no less\nbrilliant and interesting. It was practically the first chapter of his\nnew work, the \"Bible of Amiens,\"--itself intended as the first volume of\n\"Our Fathers have Told us: Sketches of the History of Christendom, for\nBoys and Girls who have been held at its Fonts.\" The distinctly\nreligious tone of the work was noticed as marking, if not a change, a\nstrong development of a tendency which had been strengthening for some\ntime past.\n\nEarly in 1879 the Rev. F.A. Malleson, vicar of Broughton, near Coniston,\nhad asked him to write, for the Furness Clerical Society's Meetings, a\nseries of letters on the Lord's Prayer. In them he dwelt upon the need\nof living faith in the Fatherhood of God, and childlike obedience to the\ncommands of old-fashioned religion and morality. He criticised the\nEnglish liturgy as compared with medi\u00e6val forms of prayer; and pressed\nupon his hearers the strongest warnings against evasion, or explaining\naway of stern duties and simple faiths. He concluded:\n\n\n     \"No man more than I has ever loved the place where God's honour\n     dwells, or yielded truer allegiance to the teaching of His evident\n     servants. No man at this time grieves more for the damage of the\n     Church which supposes him her enemy, while she whispers\n     procrastinating _pax vobiscum_ in answer to the spurious kiss of\n     those who would fain toll curfew over the last fires of English\n     faith, and watch the sparrows find nest where she may lay her\n     young, around the altars of the Lord.\"\n\nBut if the Anglican Church refused him, the Roman Church was eager to\nclaim him. His interest in medi\u00e6valism seemed to point him out as ripe\nfor conversion. Cardinal Manning, an old acquaintance, showed him\nspecial attention, and invited him to charming _t\u00eate-\u00e0-t\u00eate_ luncheons.\nIt was commonly reported that he had gone over, or was going. But two\nletters (of a later date) show that he was not to be caught. To a\nGlasgow correspondent he wrote in 1887:\n\n\n     \"I shall be entirely grateful to you if you will take the trouble\n     to contradict any news gossip of this kind, which may be disturbing\n     the minds of any of my Scottish friends. I was, am, and can be,\n     only a Christian Catholic in the wide and eternal sense. I have\n     been that these five-and-twenty years at least. Heaven keep me from\n     being less as I grow older! But I am no more likely to become a\n     Roman Catholic than a Quaker, Evangelical, or Turk.\"\n\nTo another, next year, he wrote:\n\n\n     \"I fear you have scarcely read enough of 'Fors' to know the breadth\n     of my own creed or communion. I gladly take the bread, water, wine,\n     or meat of the Lord's Supper with members of my own family or\n     nation who obey Him, and should be equally sure it was His giving,\n     if I were myself worthy to receive it, whether the intermediate\n     mortal hand were the Pope's, the Queen's, or a hedge-side gipsy's.\"\n\nAt Coniston he was on friendly terms with Father Gibson, the Roman\nCatholic priest, and gave a window to the chapel, which several of the\nBrantwood household attended. But though he did not go to Church, he\ncontributed largely to the increase of the poorly-endowed curacy, and to\nthe charities of the parish. The religious society of the neighbourhood\nwas hardly of a kind to attract him, unless among the religious society\nshould be included the Thwaite, where lived the survivors of a family\nlong settled at Coniston--Miss Mary Beever, scientific and political;\nand Miss Susanna, who won Mr. Ruskin's admiration and affection by an\ninterest akin to his own in nature and in poetry, and by her love for\nanimals, and bright, unfailing wit. Both ladies were examples of\nsincerely religious life, \"at once sources and loadstones of all good to\nthe village,\" as he wrote in the preface to \"Hortus Inclusus,\" the\ncollection of his letters to them since first acquaintance in the autumn\nof 1873. The elder Miss Beever died at an advanced age on the last day\nof 1883; Miss Susanna survived until October, 29, 1893.\n\nIn children he took a warm and openly-expressed interest. He used to\nvisit the school often, and delighted to give them a treat. On January\n13th, 1881, he gave a dinner to 315 Coniston youngsters, and the tone of\nhis address to his young guests is noteworthy as taken in connection\nwith the drift of his religious tendency during this period. He dwelt on\na verse of the Sunday School hymn they had been singing: \"Jesu, here\nfrom sin deliver.\" \"That is what we want,\" he said; \"to be delivered\nfrom our sins. We must look to the Saviour to deliver us from our sin.\nIt is right we should be punished for the sins which we have done; but\nGod loves us, and wishes to be kind to us, and to help us, that we may\nnot wilfully sin.\"\n\nAt this time he used to take the family prayers himself at Brantwood:\npreparing careful notes for a Bible-reading, which sometimes, indeed,\nlasted longer than was convenient to the household; and writing collects\nfor the occasion, still existing in manuscript, and deeply interesting\nas the prayers of a man who had passed through so many wildernesses of\nthought and doubt, and had returned at last--not to the fold of the\nChurch, but to the footstool of the Father.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE RECALL TO OXFORD (1882-1883)\n\n\nThis Brantwood life came to an end with the end of 1881. Early in the\nnext year he went for change of scene to stay with the Severns at his\nold home on Herne Hill. He seemed much better, and ventured to reappear\nin public. On March 3rd he went to the National Gallery to sketch\nTurner's Python. On the unfinished drawing is written: \"Bothered away\nfrom it, and never went again. No light to work by in the next month.\"\nAn artist in the Gallery had been taking notes of him for a\nsurreptitious portrait--an embarrassing form of flattery.\n\nHe wrote: \"No--I won't believe any stories about overwork. It's\nimpossible, when one's in good heart and at really pleasant things. I've\na lot of nice things to do, but the heart fails--after lunch,\nparticularly!\" Heart and head did, however, fail again; and another\nattack of brain fever followed. Sir William Gull brought him through,\nand won his praise as a doctor and esteem as a friend. Ruskin took it as\na great compliment when Sir William, in acknowledging his fee, wrote\nthat he should keep the cheque as an autograph.\n\nBy Easter Monday the patient was better again, and plunging into work in\nspite of everybody. He wrote:\n\n\n     \"I was not at all sure, myself, till yesterday, whether I _would_\n     go abroad; also I should have told you before. But as you have had\n     the (sorrowful?) news broken to you--and as I find Sir William Gull\n     perfectly fixed in his opinion, I obey him, and reserve only some\n     liberty of choice to myself--respecting, not only climate,--but the\n     general appearance of the--inhabitants, of the localities, where\n     for antiquarian or scientific research I may be induced to prolong\n     my sojourn.--Meantime I send you--to show you I haven't come to\n     town for nothing, my last bargain in beryls, with a little topaz\n     besides....\"\n\nBut the journey was put off week after week. There was so much to do,\nbuying diamonds for Sheffield museum, and planning a collection of\nmodels to show the normal forms of crystals, and to illustrate a subject\nwhich he thought many people would find interesting, if they could be\ngot over its first difficulties. Not only Sheffield was to receive these\ngifts and helps: Ruskin had become acquainted with the Rev. J.P.\nFaunthorpe, Principal of Whitelands College for Pupil Teachers, and had\ngiven various books and collections to illustrate the artistic side of\neducation. Now he instituted there the May Queen Festival, in some sort\ncarrying out his old suggestion in \"Time and Tide.\" Mr. A. Severn\ndesigned a gold cross, and it was presented, with a set of volumes of\nRuskin's works, sumptuously bound, to the May Queen and her maidens. The\npretty festival became a popular feature of the school, \"patronised by\nroyalty,\" and Ruskin continued his annual gift to Whitelands, and kept\nup a similar institution at the High School at Cork.\n\nAt last, in August, he started for the Continent and stayed a while at\nAvallon in central France, a district new to him. There he met Mr. Frank\nRandal, one of the artists working for St. George's Guild, and explored\nthe scenery and antiquities of a most interesting neighbourhood. He\ndrove over the Jura in the old style, revisited Savoy, and after weeks\nof bitter _bise_ and dark weather, a splendid sunset cleared the hills.\nHe wrote to Miss Beever:--\"I saw Mont Blanc again to-day, unseen since\n1877; and was very thankful. It is a sight that always redeems me to\nwhat I am capable of at my poor little best, and to what loves and\nmemories are most precious to me.\"\n\nAt Annecy he was pleased to find the waiter at the H\u00f4tel Verdun\nremembered his visit twenty years before;--everywhere he met old\nfriends, and saw old scenes that he had feared he never would revisit.\nAfter crossing the Cenis and hastening through Turin and Genoa, he\nreached Lucca, to be awaited at the Albergo Reale dell' Universo by a\ncrowd, every one anxious to shake hands with Signor Ruskin. No\nwonder!--for instead of allowing himself to be a mere Number-so-and-so\nin a hotel, wherever he felt comfortable--and that was everywhere except\nat pretentious modern hotels--he made friends with the waiter, chatted\nwith the landlord, found his way into the kitchen to compliment the\ncook, and forgot nobody in the establishment--not only in \"tips,\" but in\na frank and sympathetic address which must have contrasted curiously, in\ntheir minds, with the reserve and indifference of other English\ntourists.\n\nAt Florence he met Mr. Henry Roderick Newman, an American artist who had\nbeen at Coniston and was working for the Guild. He introduced Ruskin to\nMrs. and Miss Alexander. In these ladies' home he found his own aims, in\nreligion, philanthropy, and art, realised in an unexpected way. Miss\nAlexander's drawing at first struck him by its sincerity. Not only did\nshe draw beautifully, but she also wrote a beautiful hand; and it had\nbeen one of his old sayings that missal-writing, rather than\nmissal-painting, was the admirable thing in medi\u00e6val art. The legends\nillustrated by her drawings were collected by herself, through an\nintimate acquaintance with Italians of all classes, from the nobles to\nthe peasantry, whom she understood and loved, and by whom she was loved\nand understood. By such intercourse she had learned to look beneath the\nsurface. In religious matters her American common-sense saw through her\nneighbours--saw the good in them as well as the weakness--and she was as\nfriendly, not only in social intercourse, but in spiritual things, with\nthe worthy village priest as with T.P. Rossetti,[47] the leader of the\nProtestant \"Brethren,\" whom she called her pastor. And Ruskin, who had\nbeen driven away from Protestantism by the poor Waldensian at Turin, and\nhad wandered through many realms of doubt and voyaged through strange\nseas of thought, alone, found harbour at last with the disciple of a\nmodern evangelist, the frequenter of the little meeting-house of outcast\nItalian Protestants.\n\n[Footnote 47: A cousin of the artist, and in his way no less remarkable\na man. A short account of his life is given in \"D.G. Rossetti, his\nfamily letters,\" Vol. I., p. 34. The circumstances of his death are\ntouchingly related by Miss Alexander in \"Christ's Folk; in the\nApennine.\"]\n\nOne evening before dinner he brought back to the hotel at Florence a\ndrawing of a lovely girl lying dead in the sunset; and a little\nnote-book. \"I want you to look over this,\" he said, in the way, but not\nquite in the tone, with which the usual MS. \"submitted for criticism\"\nwas tossed to a secretary to taste. It was \"The True Story of Ida;\nwritten by her Friend.\"\n\nAn appointment to meet Mr. E.R. Robson, who was making plans for an\nintended Sheffield museum, took him back to Lucca, to discuss Romanesque\nmouldings and marble facings. Mr. Charles Fairfax Murray also came to\nLucca with drawings commissioned for St. George's Guild. But Ruskin soon\nreturned to his new friends, and did not leave Florence finally until\nhe had purchased the wonderful collection of 110 drawings, with\nbeautifully written text, in which Miss Alexander had enshrined \"The\nRoadside Songs of Tuscany.\"\n\nReturning homewards by the Mont Cenis he stayed a while at Talloires, a\nfavourite haunt, extremely content to be among romantic scenery, and\nable to work steadily at a new edition of his books in a much cheaper\nform, of which the first volumes were at this time in hand. He had been\nmaking further studies also, in history and Alpine geology; but at last\nthe snow drove him away from the mountains. So he handed over the\ngeology to his assistant, who compiled \"The Limestone Alps of Savoy\"\n(supplementary to \"Deucalion\") \"as he could, not as he would,\" while\nRuskin wrote out the new ideas suggested by his visit to C\u00eeteaux and St.\nBernard's birthplace. These notes he completed on the journey home, and\ngave as a lecture on \"Cistercian Architecture\" (London Institution,\nDecember 4th, 1882), in place of the previously advertised lecture on\ncrystallography.\n\nHe seemed now to have quite recovered his health, and to be ready for\nre-entry into public life. What was more, he had many new things to say.\nThe attacks of brain fever had passed over him like passing storms,\nleaving a clear sky.\n\nAfter his retirement from the Oxford Professorship, a subscription had\nbeen opened for a bust by Sir Edgar Boehm, in memorial of a University\nbenefactor; and the model (now in the Sheffield Museum) was placed in\nthe Drawing School pending the collection of the necessary \u00a3220. _The\nOxford University Herald_, in its article of June 5th, 1880, no doubt\nexpressed the general feeling in reciting his benefactions to the\nUniversity with becoming appreciation.\n\nIt was natural, therefore, that on recovering his health he should\nresume his post. Professor (now Sir) W.B. Richmond, the son of his old\nfriend Mr. George Richmond, gracefully retired, and the _Oxford\nUniversity Gazette_ of January 16th, 1883, announced the re-election.\nOn March 2nd he wrote that he was \"up the Old Man yesterday\"; as much as\nto say that he defied catechism, now, about his health; and a week later\nhe gave his first lecture. The _St. James's Budget_ of March 16th gave\nan account of it in these terms:\n\n\n     \"Mr. Ruskin's first lecture at Oxford attracted so large an\n     audience that, half-an-hour before the time fixed for its delivery,\n     a greater number of persons were collected about the doors than the\n     lecture-room could hold. Immediately after the doors were opened\n     the room was so densely packed that some undergraduates found it\n     convenient to climb into the windows and on to the cupboards. The\n     audience was composed almost equally of undergraduates and ladies;\n     with the exception of the vice-chancellor, heads of houses,\n     fellows, and tutors were chiefly conspicuous by their absence.\"\n\nI omit an abstract of the lecture, which can be read in full in the \"Art\nof England.\" The reporter continued:\n\n\n     \"He had made some discoveries: two lads and two lasses, who[48] ...\n     could draw in a way to please even him. He used to say that, except\n     in a pretty graceful way, no woman can draw; he had now almost come\n     to think that no one else can. (This statement the undergraduates\n     received with gallant, if undiscriminating, applause.) To many of\n     his prejudices, Mr. Ruskin said, in the last few years the axe had\n     been laid. He had positively found an American, a young lady, whose\n     life and drawing were in every way admirable. (Again great and\n     generous applause on the part of the undergraduates, stimulated, no\n     doubt, by the knowledge that there were then in the room two fair\n     Americans, who have lately graced Oxford by their presence.) At the\n     end of his lecture Mr. Ruskin committed himself to a somewhat\n     perilous statement. He had found two young Italian artists in whom\n     the true spirit of old Italian art had yet lived. No hand like\n     theirs had been put to paper since Lippi and Leonardo.\"\n\n[Footnote 48: Referring to Misses Alexander and Greenaway, and Messrs.\nBoni and Alessandri.]\n\nThree more lectures of the course were given in May, and each repeated\nto a second audience. Coming to London, he gave a private lecture on\nJune 5th to some two hundred hearers at the house of Mrs. W.H. Bishop,\nin Kensington, on Miss Kate Greenaway and Miss Alexander. The\n_Spectator_ shared his enthusiasm for the pen and ink drawings of Miss\nAlexander's \"Roadside Songs of Tuscany,\" and concluded a glowing account\nof the lecture by saying: \"All Professor Ruskin's friends must be glad\nto see how well his Oxford work has agreed with him. He has gifts of\ninsight and power of reaching the best feelings and highest hopes of our\ntoo indifferent generation which are very rare.\"\n\nWith much encouragement in his work, he returned to Brantwood for the\nsummer, and resolved upon another visit to Savoy for more geology, and\nanother breath of health-giving Alpine air. But he found time only for a\nshort tour in Scotland before returning to Oxford to complete the series\nof lectures on recent English Art. During this term he was prevailed\nupon to allow himself to be nominated as a candidate for the Rectorship\nof the University of Glasgow. He had been asked to stand in the\nConservative interest in 1880, and he had been worried into a rather\nrough reply to the Liberal party, when after some correspondence they\nasked him whether he sympathised with Lord Beaconsfield or Mr.\nGladstone. \"What, in the devil's name,\" he exclaimed, \"have _you_ to do\nwith either Mr. D'Israeli or Mr. Gladstone? You are students at the\nUniversity, and have no more business with politics than you have with\nrat-catching. Had you ever read ten words of mine with understanding,\nyou would have known that I care no more either for Mr. D'Israeli or Mr.\nGladstone than for two old bagpipes with the drones going by steam, but\nthat I hate all Liberalism as I do Beelzebub, and that, with Carlyle, I\nstand, we two alone now in England, for God and the Queen.\" After that,\nthough he might explain[49] that he never under any conditions of\nprovocation or haste, would have said that he hated Liberalism as he did\n_Mammon_, or Belial, or Moloch; that he \"chose the milder fiend of Ekron\nas the true exponent and patron of Liberty, the God of Flies,\" still the\nmatter-of-fact Glaswegians were minded to give the scoffer a wide berth.\nHe was put up as an independent candidate in the three-cornered duel;\nand, as such candidates usually fare, he fared badly. The only wonder is\nthat three hundred and nineteen students were found to vote for him,\ninstead of siding, in political orthodoxy, with Mr. Fawcett or the\nMarquis of Bute.\n\n[Footnote 49: Epilogue to \"Arrows of the Chace.\"]\n\nAt last a busy and eventful year came to a close at Coniston, with a\nlecture at the village Institute on his old friend Sir Herbert Edwardes\n(December 22nd). His interest in the school and the schoolchildren was\nunabated, and he was always planning new treats for them, or new helps\nto their lessons. He had set one of the assistants to make a large\nhollow globe, inside of which one could sit and see the stars as\nluminous points pricked through the mimic \"vault of heaven,\" painted\nblue and figured with the constellations. By a simple arrangement of\ncogs and rollers the globe revolved, the stars rose and set, and the\nposition of any star at any hour of the year could be roughly fixed. But\nthe inclement climate of Coniston, and the natural roughness of\nchildren, soon wrecked the new toy.\n\nAbout this time he was anxious to get the village children taught music\nwith more accuracy of tune and time than the ordinary singing-lessons\nenforced. He made many experiments with different simple instruments,\nand fixed at last upon a set of bells, which he wanted to introduce into\nthe school. But it was difficult to interfere with the routine of\nstudies prescribed by the Code. Considering that he scorned \"the three\nR's,\" a school after his own heart would have been a very different\nplace from any that earns the Government grant; and he very strongly\nbelieved that if a village child learnt the rudiments of religion and\nmorality, sound rules of health and manners, and a habit of using its\neyes and ears in the practice of some good handicraft or art and simple\nmusic, and in natural philosophy, taught by object lessons--then\nbook-learning would either come of itself, or be passed aside as\nunnecessary or superfluous. This was his motive in a well-known incident\nwhich has sometimes puzzled his public. Once, when new buildings were\ngoing on, the mason wanted an advance of money, which Mr. Ruskin gave\nhim, and then held out the paper for him to sign the receipt. \"A great\ndeal of hesitation and embarrassment ensued, somewhat to Mr. Ruskin's\nsurprise, as he knows a north-country-man a great deal too well to\nexpect embarrassment from him. At last the man said, in dialect: 'Ah mun\nput ma mark!' He could not write. Mr. Ruskin rose at once, stretched out\nboth hands to the astonished rustic, with the words: 'I am proud to know\nyou. Now I understand why you are such an entirely good workman.'\"\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE STORM-CLOUD (1884-1888)\n\n\nThe sky had been a favourite subject of study with the author of \"Modern\nPainters.\" His journals for fifty years past had kept careful account of\nthe weather, and effects of cloud. He had noticed since 1871 a\nprevalence of chilly, dark _bise_, as it would be called in France; but\ndifferent in its phenomena from anything of his earlier days. The\n\"plague wind,\" so he named it--tremulous, intermittent, blighting grass\nand trees--blew from no fixed point of the compass, but always brought\nthe same dirty sky in place of the healthy rain-cloud of normal summers;\nand the very thunder-storms seemed to be altered by its influence into\nfoul and powerless abortions of tempest. We should now be disposed to\ncall this simply \"the smoke nuisance,\" but feeling as he did the weight\nof human wrong against which it was his mission to prophesy, believing\nin a Divine government of the world in all its literalness, he had the\ncourage to appear before a London audience,[50] like any seer of old,\nand to tell them that this eclipse of heaven was--if not a judgment--at\nall events a symbol of the moral darkness of a nation that had\n\"blasphemed the name of God deliberately and openly; and had done\niniquity by proclamation, every man doing as much injustice to his\nbrother as it was in his power to do.\"\n\n[Footnote 50: \"The Storm-Cloud of the Nineteenth Century,\" London\nInstitution, February 4th, 1884; repeated with variations and additions\na week later.]\n\nIn the autumn, at Oxford, he took up his parable again. His lectures on\n\"The Pleasures of England\" he intended as a sketch of the main stream of\nhistory from his own religious standpoint. It was a noble theme, and one\nwhich his breadth of outlook and detailed experience would have fitted\nhim to handle; but he was already nearing the limit of his vital powers.\nHe had been suffering from depression throughout the summer, unrelieved\nby the energetic work for St. George's Museum, which in other days might\nhave been a relaxation from more serious thought. He had been editing\nMiss Alexander's \"Roadside Songs of Tuscany,\" and recasting earlier\nworks of his own, incessantly busy; presuming upon the health he had\nenjoyed, and taking no hints nor advice from anxious friends, who would\nhave been glad to have seen the summer spent in change of scene and\nholiday-making.\n\nAt Oxford he was watched with concern--restless and excited, too\nabsorbed in his crusade against the tendencies of the modern scientific\nparty, too vehement and unguarded in his denunciations of colleagues,\ntoo bitter against the new order of things which, to his horror, was\nintroducing vivisection in the place of the old-fashioned natural\nhistory he loved, and speculative criticism instead of \"religious and\nuseful learning.\"\n\nHe was persuaded to cancel his last three attacks on modern life and\nthought--\"The Pleasures of Truth,\" of \"Sense,\" and of \"Nonsense\"--and to\nsubstitute readings from earlier works, hastily arranged and re-written;\nand his friends breathed more freely when he left Oxford without another\nserious attack of brain-disease. He wrote on December 1st, 1884, to Miss\nBeever:\n\n\n     \"I gave my fourteenth, and last for this year, lecture with vigour\n     and effect, and am safe and well (D.G.) after such a spell of work\n     as I never did before.\"\n\nTo another correspondent, a few days later:\n\n\n     \"Here are two lovely little songs for you to put tunes to, and sing\n     to me. You'll have both to be ever so good to me, for I've been\n     dreadfully bothered and battered here. I've bothered other people a\n     little, too,--which is some comfort!\"\n\nBut in spite of everything, the vote was passed to establish a\nphysiological laboratory at the museum; to endow vivisection--which to\nhim meant not only cruelty to animals, but a complete misunderstanding\nof the purpose of science, and defiance of the moral law. He resigned\nhis Professorship, with the sense that all his work had been in vain,\nthat he was completely out of touch with the age, and that he had best\ngive up the unequal fight.\n\nIn former times when he had found himself beaten in his struggles with\nthe world, he had turned to geology for a resource and a relief; but\ngeology, too, was part of the field of battle now. The memories of his\nearly youth and the bright days of his boyhood came back to him as the\nonly antidote to the distress and disappointments of his age, and he\nstrove to forget everything in \"bygones\"--\"Pr\u00e6terita.\"\n\nIt was Professor Norton who had suggested that he should write his own\nlife. He had begun to tell the story, bit by bit, in \"Fors.\" On the\njourney of 1882 he made a point of revisiting most of the scenes of\nyouthful work and travel, to revive his impressions; but the meeting\nwith Miss Alexander gave him new interests, and his return to Oxford put\nthe autobiography into the background.\n\nNow, at last he collected the scattered notes, and completed his first\nvolume, which brings the account up to the time of his coming of age. It\nis not a connected and systematic biography; it omits many points of\ninterest, especially the steps of his early successes and mental\ndevelopment; but it is the brightest conceivable picture of himself and\nhis surroundings--\"scenes and thoughts perhaps worthy of memory,\" as the\ntitle modestly puts it--told with inimitable ease and graphic power.\n\nWe have traced a life which was--even more than might be gathered from\n\"Pr\u00e6terita\"--a battle with adversities from the beginning. Not to\ndiscuss the influences of heredity, there was over-stimulus in\nchildhood; intense application to work in youth and middle-age, under\nconditions of discouragement, both public and private, which would have\nbeen fatal to many another man; and this, too, not merely hard work, but\nwork of an intense emotional nature, involving--in his view at\nleast--wide issues of life and death, in which he was another Jacob\nwrestling with the angel in the wilderness, another Savonarola imploring\nreconciliation between God and man.\n\nWithout a life of singular temperance, without unusual moral principle\nand self-command, he would long ago have fallen like other men of genius\nof his passionate type. He outlived \"consumptive\" tendencies in youth;\nand the repeated indications of over-strain in later life, up to the\ntime of his first serious break-down in 1878, had issued in nothing\nmore than the depression and fatigue with which most busy men are\nfamiliar. He had been accustomed to hear himself called mad--the defence\nof Turner was thought by the _dilettanti_ of the time to be possible\nonly to a lunatic; the author of \"Stones of Venice,\" we saw, was insane\nin the eyes of his critic, the architect; it was seriously whispered\nwhen he wrote on Political Economy that Ruskin was out of his mind; and\nso on. Every new thing he put forward \"made Quintilian stare and gasp,\"\nand _soi-disant_ friends shake their heads, until a still newer\nnine-days' wonder appeared from his pen. The break-down of 1878, so\ndifficult to explain to his public, made it appear that the common\nreproach might after all be coming true. The recurrence of a similar\nillness in 1881 and 1882 made it still more to be feared. It seemed as\nthough his life's work was to be invalidated by his age's failure; it\nseemed that the stale, shallow reproach might only too easily be\njustifiable.\n\nThese attacks of mental disease, which at his recall to Oxford seemed to\nhave been safely distanced, after his resignation began again at more\nand more frequent intervals. Crash after crash of tempest fell upon\nhim--clearing away for a while only to return with fiercer fury, until\nthey left him beaten down and helpless at last, to learn that he must\naccept the lesson and bow before the storm. Like another prophet who had\nbeen very jealous for the Lord God of Hosts, he was to feel tempest and\nearthquake and fire pass over him, before hearing the still small voice\nthat bade him once more take courage, and live in quietness and in\nconfidence, for the sake of those whom he had forgotten, when he cried,\n\"I, even I only, am left.\"\n\nFrom one who has been out in the storm the reader will not expect a cool\nrecital of its effects. The delirium of brain-fever brings strange\nthings to pass; and, no doubt, afforded ground for the painful gossip,\nof which there has been more than enough--much of it absurdly untrue,\nthe romancing of ingenious newspaper-correspondents; some of it, the\nlie that is half a truth. For in these times there were not wanting\nparasites such as always prey upon creatures in disease, as well as weak\nadmirers who misunderstood their hero's natural character, and entirely\nfailed to grasp his situation.\n\nLet such troubles of the past be forgotten: all that I now remember of\nmany a weary night and day is the vision of a great soul in torment, and\nthrough purgatorial fires the ineffable tenderness of the real man\nemerging, with his passionate appeal to justice and baffled desire for\ntruth. To those who could not follow the wanderings of the wearied brain\nit was nothing but a horrible or a grotesque nightmare. Some, in those\ntrials, learnt as they could not otherwise have learnt to know him, and\nto love him as never before.\n\nThere were many periods of health, or comparative health, even in those\nyears. While convalescent from the illness of 1885 he continued\n\"Pr\u00e6terita\" and \"Dilecta,\" the series of notes and letters illustrating\nhis life. In connection with early reminiscences, he amused himself by\nreproducing his favourite old nursery book, \"Dame Wiggins of Lee.\" He\nedited the works of one or two friends, wrote occasionally to\nnewspapers--notably on books and reading, to the _Pall Mall Gazette_, in\nthe \"Symposium\" on the best hundred books. He continued his arrangements\nfor the Museum, and held an exhibition (June, 1886) of the drawings made\nunder his direction for the Guild.\n\nHe was already drifting into another illness when he sent the famous\nreply to an appeal for help to pay off the debt on a chapel at Richmond.\nThe letter is often misquoted for the sake of raising a laugh, so that\nit is not out of place to reprint it as a specimen of the more vehement\nexpressions of this period. The reader of his life must surely see,\nthrough the violence of the wording, a perfectly consistent and\nreasonable expression of Mr. Ruskin's views:--\n\n\"BRANTWOOD, CONISTON, LANCASHIRE.\n\n\"_May 19th_, 1886.\n\n\"SIR,\n\n\"I am scornfully amused at your appeal to me, of all people in the world\nthe precisely least likely to give you a farthing! My first word to all\nmen and boys who care to hear me is 'Don't get into debt. Starve and go\nto heaven--but don't borrow. Try first begging,--I don't mind, if it's\nreally needful, stealing! But don't buy things you can't pay for!'\n\n\"And of all manner of debtors, pious people building churches they can't\npay for are the most detestable nonsense to me. Can't you preach and\npray behind the hedges--or in a sandpit--or a coal-hole--first?\n\n\"And of all manner of churches thus idiotically built iron churches are\nthe damnablest to me.\n\n\"And of all the sects of believers in any ruling spirit--Hindoos, Turks,\nFeather Idolaters, and Mumbo Jumbo, Log and Fire worshippers, who want\nchurches, your modern English Evangelical sect is the most absurd, and\nentirely objectionable and unendurable to me! All which they might very\neasily have found out from my books--any other sort of sect\nwould!--before bothering me to write it to them.\n\n\"Ever, nevertheless, and in all this saying, your faithful servant,\n\n\"JOHN RUSKIN.\"\n\nThe recipient of the letter promptly sold it. Only three days later,\nRuskin was writing one of the most striking passages in \"Pr\u00e6terita\"\n(vol. ii., chap. 5)--indeed, one of the daintiest landscape pieces in\nall his works, describing the blue Rhone as it flows under the bridges\nof Geneva.\n\nThis energetic letter-writing made people stare; but a more serious\nresult of these periods between strength and helplessness was the\ntendency to misunderstanding with old friends. Ruskin had spoiled many\nof them, if I may say so, by too uniform forbearance and unselfishness:\nand now that he was not always strong enough to be patient, difficulties\nensued which they had not always the tact to avert. \"The moment I have\nto scold people they say I'm crazy,\" he said, piteously, one day. And\nso, one hardly knows how, he found himself at strife on all sides.\nBefore he was fully recovered from the attack of 1886 there were\ntroubles about the Oxford drawing school; and he withdrew most of the\npictures he had there on loan. How little animosity he really felt\nagainst Oxford is shown from the fact that early in the next year\n(February, 1887) he was planning with his cousin, Wm. Richardson, to\ngive \u00a35,000 to the drawing school, as a joint gift in memory of their\ntwo mothers. Mr. Richardson's death, and Ruskin's want of means--for he\nhad already spent all his capital--put an end to the scheme. But the\nremaining loans, including important and valuable drawings by himself,\nhe did not withdraw, and it is to be hoped they may stay there to show\nnot only the artist's hand but the friendly heart of the founder and\nbenefactor.\n\nIn April, 1887, came the news of Laurence Hilliard's death in the\nAegean, with a shock that intensified the tendency to another recurrence\nof illness. For months the situation caused great anxiety. In August he\nposted with Mrs. A. Severn towards the south, and took up his quarters\nat Folkestone, moving soon after to Sandgate, where he remained, with\nshort visits to town, until the following summer--better, or worse, from\nweek to week--sometimes writing a little for \"Pr\u00e6terita,\" or preparing\nmaterial for the continuation of unfinished books; but bringing on his\nmalady with each new effort. In June, 1888, he went with Mr. Arthur\nSevern to Abbeville, and made his headquarters for nearly a month at the\nT\u00eate de Boeuf. Here he was arrested for sketching the fortifications and\nexamined at the police station, much to his amusement. At Abbeville,\ntoo, he met Mr. Detmar Blow, a young architect, whom he asked to\naccompany him to Italy. They stayed awhile at Paris,--drove, as in 1882,\nover the Jura, and up to Chamouni, where Ruskin wrote the epilogue to\nthe reprint of \"Modern Painters\"; then, by Martigny and the Simplon,\nthey went to visit Mrs. and Miss Alexander at Bassano; and thence to\nVenice. They returned by the St. Gothard, reaching Herne Hill early in\nDecember.\n\nBut this journey did not, as it had been hoped, put him in possession of\nhis strength like the journey of 1882. Then, he had returned to public\nlife with new vigour; now, his best hours were hours of feebleness and\ndepression; and he came home to Brantwood in the last days of the year,\nwearied to death, to wait for the end.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nDATUR HORA QUIETI (1889-1900)\n\n\nIn the summer of 1889, at Seascale, on the Cumberland coast, Ruskin was\nstill busy upon \"Pr\u00e6terita.\" He had his task planned out to the finish:\nin nine more chapters he meant to conclude his third volume with a\nreview of the leading memories of his life, down to the year 1875, when\nthe story was to close. Passages here and there were written, material\ncollected from old letters and journals, and the contents and titles of\nthe chapters arranged; but the intervals of strength had become fewer\nand shorter, and at last, in spite of all his courage and energy, he was\nbrought face to face with the fact that his powers were ebbing away, and\nthat head and hand would do their work no more.\n\nHe could not finish \"Pr\u00e6terita\"; but he could not leave it without\nrecord of one companionship of his life, which was, it seemed, all that\nwas left to him of the old times and the old folks at home. And so,\nsetting aside the plans he had made, he devoted the last chapter, as his\nforebodings told him it must be, to his cousin, Mrs. Arthur Severn, and\nwrote the story of \"Joanna's Care.\"\n\nIn his bedroom at Seascale, morning after morning, he still worked, or\ntried to work, as he had been used to do on journeys farther afield in\nbrighter days. But now he seemed lost among the papers scattered on his\ntable; he could not fix his mind upon them, and turned from one subject\nto another in despair; and yet patient, and kindly to those with him\nwhose help he could no longer use, and who dared not show--though he\ncould not but guess--how heart-breaking it was.\n\nThey put the best face upon it, of course: drove in the afternoons about\nthe country--to Muncaster Castle, to Calder Abbey, where he tried to\nsketch once more; and when the proofs of \"Joanna's Care\" were finally\nrevised, to Wastwater. But travelling now was no longer restorative.\n\nIt added not a little to the misfortunes of the time that two of his\nbest friends in the outside world were disputing over a third. By nobody\nwas Carlyle's reputation more valued, and yet he acknowledged that\nFroude was but telling the truth in the revelations which so surprised\nthe public; and much as he admired Norton, he deprecated the attack on\nCarlyle's literary executor, whose motives he understood and approved.\n\nIn August, after his return to Coniston, the storm-cloud came down upon\nhim once more. It was only in the summer of 1890 that he was able to get\nabout. But firmly convinced that his one chance lay in absolute rest and\nquiet, he wisely refused any sort of exertion, and was rewarded by a\ntemporary improvement in health and strength.\n\nIn the meantime he was obliged to hand over to others such parts of his\nwork as others could do. The St. George's Guild still continued in\nexistence, though it naturally lost much of its interest, and the whole\nof its distinctive mission, when he ceased to be able to direct it. The\nMuseum had quite outgrown its cottage at Walkley, never intended for\nmore than temporary premises; and for ten years there had been talk of\nnew buildings, at first on the spot, then on the Guild's ground at\nBewdley, where, at one time, Ruskin planned a fairy palace in the woods,\nwith cloistered hostelries for the wandering student. Such schemes were\nstopped less by his illness than by want of means.\n\nSheffield, however, did not wish to lose the Museum, and offered to\nhouse it if the Guild would present it to the town. That was, of course,\nout of the question. But a new offer to take over the collection on\nloan, the Guild paying a curator, was another matter, and was thankfully\naccepted. The Corporation fulfilled their share of the bargain with\ngenerosity. An admirable site was assigned at Meersbrook Park, in a fine\nold hall surrounded with trees, and overlooking a broad view of the town\nand country. On April 15th, 1890, the Museum was opened by the Earl of\nCarlisle, in presence of the Corporation, the Trustees of the Guild, and\na large assembly of friends and Sheffield townspeople. Since then the\nattendance of visitors and students shows that the collection is\nappreciated by the public; and it is to be hoped that though nominally a\nloan it will remain there in perpetuity, and that it will be maintained\nand used with due regard to the intentions of the founder.\n\nMany other plans had to be modified, as he found himself less able to\nwork, and was obliged to hand over his business to others. With his\nearly books he had been dissatisfied, as expressing immature views. \"The\nStones of Venice\" had been recast into two small volumes, and \"St.\nMark's Rest\" written in the attempt to supplement and correct it. But\nthe original book was obviously in demand, and a new edition was brought\nout in 1886.\n\n\"Modern Painters\" had been also on the condemned list. The aggressive\nProtestantism and the geological theories involved in his description of\nmountains he condemned as errors; moreover, at the time of the last\nedition published by Messrs. Smith & Elder (1873), he had been told\nthat the plates, which he considered a very important part of the work,\nwould not stand another impression; and so he destroyed nine of them, in\norder that no subsequent edition might be brought out in the original\nform. He reprinted vol. ii. in a cheap edition, and began to recast the\nrest, with annotations and additions, as \"In Montibus Sanctis,\" and\n\"Coeli Enarrant\", while Miss S. Beever's selections (\"Frondes Agrestes\")\nfound a ready sale. But this did not satisfy the public, and there was a\ncontinual cry for a reprint, to which, at last, he yielded. Early in\n1889 the \"Complete Edition\" appeared; with the cancelled plates\nreproduced.\n\nHe had always felt it a grievance that the enormous popularity of his\nworks in America meant an enormous piracy. Towards the end of the\n\"Fifties,\" Mr. Wiley of New York had begun to print cheap Ruskins; not,\nindeed, illegally, but without proper acknowledgment to the author, and\nwithout any reference to the author's wishes as to form and style of\nproduction. An artist and writer on art, insisting on delicacy and\nrefinement as the first necessity of draughtsmanship, and himself\nsparing no trouble or expense in the illustrations of his own works, was\nnaturally dissatisfied with the wretched \"Artotypes\" with which the\nAmerican editions caricatured his beautiful plates. Not only that, but\nit was a common practice to smuggle these editions, recommended by their\ncheapness, into other countries. Mr. Wiley sent, on an average, five\nhundred sets of \"Modern Painters\" to Europe every year, the greater\nnumber to England. His example was followed by other American\npublishers, so that in New York alone there came to be half a dozen\nhouses advertising Ruskin's works, and many more throughout the cities\nof the States. Mr. Wiley, the first in the field, proposed to pay up a\nroyalty upon all the copies he had sold if Ruskin would recognise him as\naccredited publisher in America. The offer of so large a sum would have\nbeen tempting, had it not meant that Ruskin must condone what he had for\nyears denounced, and sanction what he strongly disapproved. The case\nwould have been different if proposals had been made to reproduce his\nbooks in his own style, under competent supervision. This was done in\n1890, when arrangements were made with Messrs. Charles E. Merrill & Co.,\nof New York, to bring out the \"Brantwood\" edition of Ruskin, under the\neditorship of Professor C.E. Norton.\n\nThough the sale of Ruskin's books in America had never, until so\nrecently, brought him any profit, his own business in England, started\nin 1871 with the monthly pamphlet of \"Fors,\" and in 1872 with the volume\nof \"Sesame and Lilies,\" prospered singularly. Mr. George Allen, who,\nwhile building up an independent connection, still remained the sole\npublisher of Mr. Ruskin's works, said that the venture was successful\nfrom its earliest years. It was found that the booksellers were not\nindispensable, and that business could be done through the post as well\nas over the counter. In spite of occasional difficulties, such as the\nbringing out of works in parts, appearing irregularly or stopping\noutright at the author's illnesses, there was a steady increase of\nprofit, rising in the author's later years (according to Mr. Allen) to\nan average of \u00a34,000.\n\nFortunate it was that this bold attempt succeeded. The \u00a3200,000 he\ninherited from his parents had gone,--chiefly in gifts and in attempts\nto do good. The interest he used to spend on himself; the capital he\ngave away until it totally disappeared, except what is represented by\nthe house he lived in and its contents. The sale of his books was his\nonly income, and a great part of that went to pensioners to whom in the\ndays of his wealth he pledged himself, to relatives and friends,\ndischarged servants, institutions in which he took an interest at one\ntime or other. But he had sufficient for his wants, and no need to fear\npoverty in his old age.\n\nIn this quiet retreat at Brantwood the echoes of the outer world did\nnot sound very loudly. Ruskin had been too highly praised and too\nroundly abused, during fifty years of public life, to care what magazine\ncritics and journalists said of him. Other men of his standing could\nsolace themselves, if it be solace, in the consciousness that a grateful\ncountry has recognised their talents or their services. But civic and\nacademic honours were not likely to be showered on a man who had spent\nhis life in strenuous opposition to academicism in art and letters, and\nin vigorous attacks upon both political parties, and upon the\nestablished order of things.\n\nAnd yet Oxford and Cambridge awarded him the highest honours in their\ngift. In 1873 the Royal Society of Painters in Watercolours voted him\nhonorary member, a recognition which gave him great pleasure at the time.\nAt different dates he was elected to various societies--Geological,\nZoological, Architectural, Horticultural, Historical, Anthropological,\nMetaphysical; and to the Athen\u00e6um and Alpine Clubs. He was elected Hon.\nMember of the Academy of Florence in 1862, of the Academy of Venice,\n1877, of the Royal Academies of Antwerp and Brussels in 1892; and was\nalso an Hon. Member of the American Academy. But he did not seek\ndistinctions, and he even declined them, as in the case of the medal of\nthe Royal Institute of British Architects.\n\nA more striking form of distinction than such titles is the fact that he\nwas the first writer whose contemporaries, during his lifetime, formed\nsocieties to study his work. The first Ruskin Society was founded in\n1879 at Manchester, and was followed by the Societies of London, Glasgow\nand Liverpool. In 1887 the Ruskin Reading Guild was formed in Scotland,\nwith many local branches in England and Ireland, and a journal,\nsubsequently re-named _Igdrasil_, to promote study of literary and\nsocial subjects in Ruskin, and in writers like Carlyle and Tolstoi\ntaking a standpoint similar to his. In 1896, Ruskin Societies were\nformed at Birmingham and in the Isle of Man. Many classes and clubs for\nthe study of Ruskin were also in operation throughout America during his\nlifetime.\n\nHis eightieth birthday was the signal for an outburst of congratulations\nalmost greater than even admirers had expected. The post came late and\nloaded with flowers and letters, and all day long telegrams arrived from\nall parts of the world, until they lay in heaps, unopened for the time\nbeing. A great address had been prepared, with costly illumination on\nvellum, and binding by Mr. Cobden Sanderson.\n\n\"Year by year,\" it said, \"in ever widening extent, there is an\nincreasing trust in your teaching, an increasing desire to realize the\nnoble ideals you have set before mankind in words which we feel have\nbrought nearer to our hearts the kingdom of God upon earth. It is our\nhope and prayer that the joy and peace you have brought to others may\nreturn in full measure to your own heart filling it with the peace which\ncomes from the love of God and the knowledge of the love of your\nfellow-men.\"\n\nAmong those who subscribed to these sentiments were various people of\nimportance, such as Royal Academicians, the Royal Society of Painters in\nWatercolours, the Trustees of the British Museum and of the National\nGallery, the St. George's Guild and Ruskin Societies, with many others;\nand the address was presented by a deputation who reported that they had\nfound him looking well \"and extremely happy.\"\n\nA similar illuminated address from the University of Oxford ran thus:\n\n\n     \"We venture to send you, as you begin your eighty-first year, these\n     few words of greeting and good-will, to make you sure that in\n     Oxford the gratitude and reverence with which men think of you is\n     ever fresh. You have helped many to find in life more happiness\n     than they thought it held; and we trust there is happiness in the\n     latter years of your long life. You have taught many to see the\n     wealth of beauty in nature and in art, prizing the remembrance of\n     it; and we trust that the sights you have best loved come back to\n     your memory with unfading beauty. You have encouraged many to keep\n     a good heart through dark days, and we trust that the courage of a\n     constant hope is yours.\"\n\nThe London Ruskin Society sent a separate address; and to show that if\nnot a prophet in his own country he was at any rate a valued friend, the\nConiston Parish Council resolved \"and carried unanimously,\" says the\nlocal journal, \"with applause,\"\n\n\n     \"That the congratulations of this council be offered to Mr. John\n     Ruskin, on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, together with\n     the warm thanks which they and all their neighbours feel for the\n     kindness he has shown, and the many generous acts he has done to\n     them and theirs during twenty-seven years of residence at Coniston,\n     where his presence is most truly appreciated, and his name will\n     always be most gratefully remembered.\"\n\nBut as the year went on he did not regain his usual summer strength.\nWalking out had become a greater weariness to him, and he had to submit\nto the humiliation of a bath-chair. To save himself even the labour of\ncreeping down to his study, he sat usually in the turret-room upstairs,\nnext to his bed-chamber, but still with the look of health in his face,\nand the fire in his eyes quite unconquered. He would listen while Baxter\nread the news to him, following public events with interest, or while\nMrs. Severn or Miss Severn read stories, novel after novel; but always\nliking old favourities best, and never anything that was unhappy. Some\npet books he would pore over, or drowse over by the hour. The last of\nthese was one in which he had a double interest, for it was about ships\nof war, and it was written by the kinsman of a dear friend. Some of the\nartists he had loved and helped had failed him or left him, but\nBurne-Jones was always true. One night, going up to bed, the old man\nstopped long to look at the photograph from Philip Burne-Jones's\nportrait of his father. \"That's my dear brother, Ned,\" he said, nodding\ngood-bye to the picture as he went. Next night the great artist died,\nand of all the many losses of these later years this one was the hardest\nto bear.\n\nSo when a little boy lent him \"A Fleet in Being\" he read and re-read it;\nthen got a copy for himself, and might have learnt it by heart, so long\nhe pored over it. But when the little boy or his sisters went to visit\nthe \"Di Pa\" (Dear Papa), as he liked children to call their old friend,\nhe had now scarcely anything to talk about. \"He just looked at us, and\nsmiled,\" they would report; \"and we couldn't think what to say.\"\n\nHe had his \"bright days,\" when he would hear business discussed, though\na very little of it was wearisome. It was impossible to bring before him\nhalf the wants and wishes of his correspondents, who could not yet\nrealise his weakness, and besought the notice they fancied so easily\ngiven. Yet in that weakness one could trace no delusions, none of the\nmental break-down which was taken for granted. If he gave an opinion it\nwas clear and sound enough; of course with the old Ruskinian waywardness\nof idea which always puzzled his public. But he knew what he was about,\nand knew what was going on. He was like the aged Queen Aud in the saga,\nwho \"rose late and went to bed early, and if anyone asked after her\nhealth she answered sharply.\"\n\nBut all the love and care spent on him could not keep him with us. There\ncame the Green Yule that makes a fat kirkyard, and in January of 1900\nhardly a house in the neighbourhood was free from the plague of\ninfluenza. In spite of strictest precautions it invaded Brantwood.\n\nOn the 18th of January he was remarkably well, as people often are\nbefore an illness--\"fey,\" as the old Northern folk-lore has it. Towards\nevening, when Mrs. Severn went to him for the usual reading--it was Edna\nLyall's \"In the Golden Days\"--his throat was irritable and he \"ached all\nover.\" They put him to bed and sent for Dr. Parsons, his constant\nmedical attendant, who found his temperature as high as 102\u00b0, and\nfeared the consequences. But the patient, as he always did, refused to\nbe considered ill, and ate his dinner, and seemed next day to be really\nbetter. There was no great cause for alarm, though naturally some for\nanxiety; and in reasonable hopes of amendment, the slight attack was not\nmade public.\n\nOn Saturday morning, the 20th, all appeared to be going well until about\nhalf-past ten. Suddenly he collapsed and became unconscious. It was the\ndreaded failure of heart after influenza. His breathing weakened, and\nthrough the morning and through the afternoon in that historic little\nroom, lined with his Turners, he lay, falling softly asleep. No efforts\ncould revive him. There was no struggle; there were no words. The\nbitterness of death was spared him. And when it was all over, and those\nwho had watched through the day turned at last from his bedside, \"sunset\nand evening star\" shone bright above the heavenly lake and the clear-cut\nblue of Coniston fells.\n\nNext morning brought messages of hurried condolence, and the Monday such\na chorus from the press as made all the praises of his lifetime seem\ntrifling and all its blame forgotten. If only, in his years of struggle\nand despair, he had known the place he should win!\n\nOn the Tuesday came a telegram offering a grave in Westminster Abbey,\nthe highest honour our nation can give to its dead. But his own mind had\nlong since been made plain on that point, and his wishes had not been\nforgotten. \"If I die here,\" he used to say, \"bury me at Coniston. I\nshould have liked, if it happened at Herne Hill, to lie with my father\nand mother in Shirley churchyard, as I should have wished, if I died\namong the Alps, to be buried in the snow.\"\n\nWe carried him on Monday night down from his bed-chamber and laid him in\nthe study. There was a pane of glass let into the coffin-lid, so that\nthe face might be kept in sight; and there it lay, among lilies of the\nvalley, and framed in the wreath sent by Mr. Watts, the great painter, a\nwreath of the true Greek laurel, the victor's crown, from the tree\ngrowing in his garden, cut only thrice before, for Tennyson and Leighton\nand Burne-Jones. It would be too long to tell of all such tokens of\naffection and respect that were heaped upon the coffin,--from the wreath\nof the Princess Louise down to the tributes of humble dependants,--above\na hundred and twenty-five, we counted; some of them the costliest money\ncould buy, some valued no less for the feeling they expressed. I am not\nsure that the most striking was not the village tailor's, with this on\nits label--\"There was a man sent from God, and his name was John.\"\n\nOn the Wednesday we made our sad procession to the church, through storm\nand flood. The village was in mourning, and round the churchyard gates\nmen, women, and children stood in throngs. The coffin was carried in by\neight of those who had been in his employ, and the church filled\nnoiselessly with neighbours and friends, who after a hymn, and the\nLord's prayer, and a long silence, passed up the aisles for their last\nlook, and to heap more offerings of wreaths and flowers around the bier.\nAt dusk tall candles were lit, and so through the winter's night watch\nwas kept.\n\nThursday, the 25th, brought together a great assembly, great for the\nremoteness of the place and the inclemency of the weather. The country\nfolk have a saying \"Happy is the dead that the rain rains on;\" and the\nfells were darkly clouded and the beck roared by, swollen to a torrent.\nThe church was far too small to hold the congregation, which included\nmost of his personal friends and the representatives of many public\nbodies. A crowd stood outside in the storm while the service went on.\n\nIt began with a hymn written for the occasion by Canon Rawnsley who with\nthe Vicar of Hawkshead, Brantwood's parish church, read the Psalms. A\nhymn, \"Comes at times a stillness as of even,\" was sung by his friend\nMiss Wakefield; and the lesson read by Canon Richmond, arrived\nofficially to represent the Bishop of Carlisle, but to most of us\nrepresenting old times and the comradeships of his youth and early\nmanhood. The Vicar of Coniston and the Rev. Reginald Meister, on behalf\nof the Dean of Christ Church, also took part in the service. When the\nDead March sounded the coffin was covered with a pall given by the\nRuskin Linen Industry of Keswick, lined with bright crimson silk, and\nembroidered with the motto, \"Unto This Last,\" and with his favourite\nwild roses showered over the gray field, just as they fall in the\n_Primavera_ of Botticelli. There was no black about his burying, except\nwhat we wore for our own sorrow; it was remembered how he hated black,\nso much that he would even have his mother's coffin painted blue; and\namong the white and green and violet of the wreaths that filled the\nchancel, none was more significant in its sympathy than Mrs. Severn's\ngreat cross of red roses.\n\nAs we carried him down the churchyard path, a drop or two fell from the\nboughs, but a gleam of sunshine, the first after many days, shot along\nthe crags from under the cloud, and the wind paused. Standing there by\nthe graveside, who could help being thankful that he had found so lovely\na resting-place after so tranquil a falling to sleep? At his feet,\nparted only by the fence and the garden, is the village school; and who\ndoes not know how he loved the children of Coniston? At his right hand\nare the graves of the Beevers; his last old friend, Miss Susan Beever,\nlies next to him. Over the spot hang the thick boughs of a fir-tree--who\ndoes not know what he has written of his favourite mountain-pine? And\nbehind the church, shut in with its dark yews', rise the crags of\nConiston, those that he wearied for in his boyhood, beneath which he\nprayed, in sickness, to lie down and rest. \"The crags are lone on\nConiston.\"\n\n\n\n\nINDEX\n\nAbbeville,\nAcland, Sir H.W., M.D.,\nAcland, Sir T.D.,\nAdairs and Agnews,\nAgnew, Miss Joan Ruskin,\n  _and see_ Severn, Mrs. A.\nAlessandri, Angelo,\nAlexander, Mrs. and Miss Francesca,\nAlice, Princess,\nAllen, Mr. George,\n\"Amiens, The Bible of,\"\nAnderson, Mr. J.R.,\nAnderson, Miss S.D.,\nAndrews, Dr. and family,\nAnimals, Ruskin and,\nAnne, Nurse,\n\"Arachne,\"\n\"Aratra Pentelici,\"\nArchitects, Royal Institute,\nArchitectural Association, lecture to,\n\"Architecture, the Poetry of,\"\n\"Architecture, the Seven Lamps of,\"\n\"Ariadne Florentina,\"\nArmytage, J.C.,\nArthur, Prince,\nAssisi,\nAvallon,\n\nBaker, Mr. George,\nBaxter, Mr. Peter,\nBeever, Miss Mary,\n  Miss Susanna, 2\n\"Bibliotheca Pastorum,\"\nBishop, Mrs. W.H.,\nBlow, Mr. Detmar J.,\nBoehm, Sir Edgar,\nBoni, Commendatore G.,\nBotticelli,\nBourdillon, Mr. F.W.,\nBoys, T.,\nBradford lectures,\nBrantwood,\nBrown, Dr. John,\n  Prof. Thomas,\n  Rawdon,\n  Rev. Walter,\nBrowning, Robert and Mrs.,\nBuckland, Dr.,\nBunney, J.W.,\nBurgess, Arthur,\nBurne-Jones, Sir Edward,\n\nCamberwell lectures,\nCambridge lectures,\nCarlyle, Thomas,\n  Mrs.,\nCarpaccio,\nCarrick and Vokins,\nCesnola, General L.P. di,\n\"Cestus of Aglaia,\"\nChamberlain, John Henry,\nChamouni,\nChrist's Hospital lecture,\nCollins, \"Charley,\"\nConiston,\n  lecture,\nCooke, Mr. E.,\nCousen, J.,\nCoutet, Joseph,\nCowper-Temple, Mr. and Mrs. (Lord and Lady Mount Temple),\n\"Crown of Wild Olive,\"\nCroydon,\nCruikshank, George,\nCutt, R.P.,\nCyanometer,\n\nDale, Rev. T.,\nDart, Henry,\nDarwin, Charles,\nDenmark Hill,\n\"Deucalion,\"\nDeverell, W.H.,\nDickinson, Lowes,\nDixon, Thomas,\nDomecq, Ad\u00e8le,\nPeter,\nDownes, David,\nDublin lecture,\n\n\"Eagle's Nest,\"\nEdinburgh lectures,\nEdwardes, Sir Herbert,\n\"Elements of Drawing,\"\n\"Ethics of the Dust,\"\nEton lectures,\nEyre, Governor,\n\nFall, Richard,\nFaunthorpe, Rev. J.P.,\nFielding, Copley,\nFleming, Mr. A.,\nFlorence,\nForbes, Principal J.D.,\nForgeries of Ruskin,\n\"Fors Clavigera,\"\n\"Friendship's Offering,\"\nFriends of Living Creatures, Society of,\nFroude, J.A.,\nFurnivall, F.J.,\n\nGeneva,\nGeology,\n  _and see_ Deucalion, Minerals\nGiessbach,\nGladstone, W.E.,\nGlasgow Rectorship,\nGlenfarg,\nGlenfinlas,\nGoodwin, Mr. Albert, R.W.S.,\nGordon, Rev. Osborne,\nGothic Revival,\nGray,\n  Euphemia (Effie),\n  Mr. George, of Perth,\n  Mr. and Mrs. Richard,\nGreenaway, Kate,\nGull, Sir Wm., M.D.,\n\nHalle, Sir Charles,\nHarding, J.D.,\nHardraw Fall,\nHarrison, W.H.,\n\"Harry and Lucy Concluded,\"\nHelps, Sir Arthur,\nHerne Hill,\nHill, Miss Octavia,\nHilliard,\n  Mrs.,\n  Miss,\n  Laurence Jermyn,\nHooper, W.H.,\nHowell, Charles Augustus,\nHunt, W. Holman,\nHunt, \"Old\" William,\n\nIlaria di Caretto,\n\nJameson, Mrs.,\nJeffery, W.,\nJephson, Dr., of Leamington,\nJowett, H. (of Hazell, Watson and Viney),\n\n\"Kata Phusin,\"\nKeble,\nKendal lecture,\nKeswick,\n\"King of the Golden River,\"\nKing's College, London,\nKingsley, Rev. W.,\n\nLangdale Linen Industry,\n\"Laws of F\u00e9sole,\"\nLe Keux, J.H.,\n\"Leoni,\"\nLeopold, Prince,\nLewis, J.F., R.A.,\nLiddell, Dean,\nLockhart, J.G.,\nLondon Institution lectures,\nLongfellow,\n\"Lord's Prayer, Letters on the,\"\nLoudon's Magazines,\n\"Love's Meinie,\"\nLucca,\nLuini,\nLupton, Thomas,\n\nMacdonald,\n  Mr. Alex.,\n  W.M., of Crossmount,\nMallock, Mr. W.H.,\nManchester lectures,\nManning, Cardinal,\n\"Marcolini,\"\nMarks, H.S., R.A.,\nMatlock,\nMatterhorn,\nMaurice, Rev. F.D.,\nMay Queens,\nMeissonier's \"Napoleon,\"\nMetaphysical Society,\nMeteorological Society,\nMillais, Sir J.E.,\nMilman, Dean,\nMinerals and Crystals,\nMitford, Miss,\n\"Modern Painters,\"\nMoore, Prof. C.H.,\n  Rev. Daniel,\nMornex,\n\"Mornings in Florence,\"\n\"Munera Pulveris,\"\nMunro of Novar,\nMurray, Mr. C. Fairfax,\nMythology,\n\nNational Gallery,\nNewman, Mr. H.R.,\nNewton, Sir Charles,\nNorthcote, James, R.A.,\nNorton, Prof. C.E.,\n\nOliver, Prof.,\nOxford:\n  Ruskin as under graduate,\n    as graduate,\n    as Professor,\n  his lectures,\n  his drawing school,\n  his Hinksey diggings,\nOxford Museum,\n\nPalermo,\nParis,\nPatmore, Coventry,\nPedigree of Ruskin,\nPerth,\nPhotography, Ruskin's early use of,\nPisa,\nPlague wind,\nPoems,\n\"Political Economy of Art,\"\nPolitics, Ruskin's attitude,\nPortraits of Ruskin, by\n  Northcote,\n  Richmond,\n  Rossetti,\n  Boehm,\nPosting-tours,\n\"Pr\u00e6terita,\"\nPre-Raphaelitism,\nPringle, Thomas,\n\"Proserpina,\"\nProut, Samuel,\nPublishing arrangements,\n  Ruskin's,\n  \"Queen of the Air,\"\n\nQueen Victoria,\n\nRailways, Ruskin's attitude toward,\nRandal, Mr. Frank,\nReligion, Ruskin's development,\nReynolds, lectures on,\nRichardson families,\n  Charles,\n  Jessie,\n  Mary (Mrs. Bolding),\n  Dr. William,\n  Mr. William,\n  _and see_ pedigree,\nRichmond, George, R.A.,\n  Sir William B., R.A.,\nRoberts, David, R.A.,\nRobson, Mr. E.R.,\nRogers, Samuel,\nRome,\nRooke, Mr. T.M., R.W.S.,\nRossetti,\n  D.G.,\n  T.P.,\nRowbotham, Mr.,\n\"Royal Academy, Notes on the,\"\nRoyal Institution lectures,\nRunciman, Mr.,\nRuskin family,\n  John James,\n  Mrs. (Margaret Cox, John\n    Ruskin's mother),\n\nSt. Andrews Rectorship,\nSt. George's Guild,\nSt. Mark's Rest,\nSt. Ursula,\nSandgate,\nSaussure,\nSeascale,\nSeddon, Thomas,\n\"Sesame and Lilies,\"\nSevern,\n  Mr. Arthur, R.I.\n  Mrs. Arthur,\n  _and see_ Agnew, Miss\n\"Sheepfolds, Notes on the Construction of,\"\nSheffield communists,\n  Museum (St. George's now \"Ruskin\"),\nSillar, W.C.,\nSmetham, James,\nSmith, Elder & Co.,\nSmith, Sydney,\nSocialism, Ruskin's attitude,\nSomervell, Mr. R.,\nSouth Kensington Museum lecture,\nSpurgeon, C.H.,\nStanfield, C., R.A.,\nStillman, W.J.,\n\"Stones of Venice,\"\nStowe, Mrs. H.B.,\nStreet-sweeping,\nSwan, Henry,\nSwiss towns, intended history,\nTalbot, Mrs., and Mr. Q.,\nTalloires,\nTaylor, Sir Henry,\nTea-shop, Ruskin's,\nTelford, Henry,\nTennyson,\nThackeray,\nThomson, Mr. George,\n\"Time and Tide,\"\nTintoret,\nToynbee, Arnold,\nTrevelyan, Sir Walter and Lady,\nTunbridge Wells,\n  lecture at,\nTurner, J.M.W.,\n\"Two Paths,\"\nTyrwhitt, Rev. R, St. J.\n\nUniversity College, London,\n  lecture at,\n\"Unto this last,\"\n\"Val d'Arno,\"\nVenice,\nVere, Aubrey de,\nVerona,\nWaldensians,\nWard, Rev. J. Clifton,\n  William,\nWatts, G.F., R.A.,\nWedderburn, Mr. A., K.C.,\nWhistler, J. McN.,\nWillett, Henry, F.G.S.,\nWindus, G.,\nWinnington school,\nWithers, Charlotte,\nWoodward, Benjamin,\nWoolwich lectures,\nWorking Men's College,\nWornum, R.N.,\nXenophon's \"Economist,\"\n\"Yewdale and its streamlets,\"\nYule, Colonel and Mrs.,\nZermatt,","title":"The Life of John Ruskin","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":99290}