Sketches from Memory

Front matter

SKETCHES FROM MEMORY

MEMORY

BY G. A. STOREY, A.R.A.

Chapter 1

SKETCHES FROM MEMORY

I

MNEMOSYNE

IT is not to write about myself that I take up the pen, but I have met with many people on my life journey who are worth writing about, and I have seen and heard many things that are worth remembering. And it is because of those I have known and cared for, and because they remain in my memory, that I am prompted to write about them, just as I have often talked about them while sitting round the fire with a cosy company smoking the friendly pipe, and looking into those bright embers, those burning cavities, which shape themselves into fairy palaces, and lead us through dreamland into the past—the past, which still exists in memory. And it may not be without interest to others, as well as myself, to recall some of those well-known characters who have passed away; to renew acquaintance with them in their everyday guise, and to listen to their very words uttered long ago.

Chapter 2

A STUDY FROM THE ELGIN MARBLES.

II

THE SCULPTOR'S STUDIO

NOW, the first name that occurs to me in this recollective mood is one that is a household word, one that is dear to every right-minded reader of the English language—it is the name of Charles Dickens. Not only was his "Cricket on the Hearth" one of the first books that I became possessed of, but its author was the first great man whom I was introduced to, and this is how it happened.

Some friend of the family had seen scribblings of mine on half-sheets of note-paper which were considered wonderful, both by him and the family. This friend, Mr. Stultz, a rich, prosperous man, who had made a fortune by tailoring, was building some alms-houses in Kentish Town for the shelter- ing of a certain number of the less successful of his calling, and it was only right and proper that a bust of the kind founder should be put up as a memorial of his charity. To this end, he was sitting to Behnès, the sculptor, in Osnaburgh Street, and it struck him that an introduction to that gentleman might be a means of bringing out the latent talent of little Adolphus, who was then nine years old.

I remember he took me with him in his carriage and introduced me into that strangest of strange places, as it seemed to me then, a sculptor's studio. There were strange men in blouses, with shades over their eyes, and rows of busts with no eyes at all; gaunt figures without clothes, and gaunt figures with cloaks and trousers and boots and whiskers and rolls of parchment, all in marble. And there were great blocks of marble about, with busts and figures just coming out of them; the whole place being lighted in such a dim, mysterious way, that it was enough to frighten a nervous little boy who had already been startled by a monkey that ran up and down a pillar just outside and made faces at him.

Mr. Behnès, the presiding genius of the place, received me very kindly—said I could go there whenever I liked to draw from the casts or make models from them. He gave me buns to eat, and a great lump of clay, which I was to fashion into a horse's head, or, if I preferred, I could turn it into the enormous toes of the Farnese Hercules.

One day, as I was engaged in the latter effort, a bright, lively young man, good-looking, and with dark flowing locks, entered the studio, accompanied by Behnès, and took his seat in a comfortable armchair on a revolving platform. He, too, seemed amused at the scene—and very much so when he caught sight of a small boy sitting in front of a foot almost as big as himself, with a bun on one side, and a large lump of clay on the other, which he was trying to thumb into shape. I was the little boy, and the lively young man with dark flowing locks was Charles Dickens. He came and looked over me, patted me on the head and said some kind things, but I did not know who he was till afterwards.

The sitting over, he took his departure, accompanied by Behnès; but they were no sooner gone than the men in blouses, with shades over their eyes, came stealthily in to see the master's work and to criticise the clay features and the clay curls of the great novelist. And then they came up to me and asked me all about him and what he had talked about, and said, "Don't you know who he is?" And then they told me that he was the author of "Pickwick," and "Nicholas Nickleby," and "Oliver Twist," and "Sketches by Boz," and "Master Humphrey's Clock," &c.; and I was delighted, for I had copied the portrait of Mr. Pickwick, and Mr. Weller with his pipe, and Sam, and others, and it was through these very copies, which had been considered so wonderful, that I found myself in Behnès's studio, beginning almost in play an art career, which I had no idea then would have developed into a reality.

Although I cannot remember what Charles Dickens said to me, I can remember that during the sitting he was very animated and talkative, and spoke of an accident he had been in, and that a wheel was within two inches of his head as he lay on the ground, but that he escaped uninjured.

Here, then, was the bust in embryo of Charles Dickens, for it was all lumps and finger holes; and just behind it was the bust of Mr. Stultz, the "Poole" of his day, with curls and whiskers and full cheeks and a Roman toga, if I remember rightly; and the strange man, with a German name and of German descent, who put on the lumps, but whose features I cannot call to mind, was standing in front of his work. He was a clever man, and invented a means of drilling the marble in order to make an exact copy of the cast from the clay, which, I believe, is now universally used. Of course, he must have worn a cap—perhaps a paper cap. Alas perhaps, a fool's cap, for he ended his days in poverty, and died in Middlesex Hospital. I heard this and several other curious things about Behnès, from Thomas Fowke, who was with him for some time as assistant carver. Poor Fowke, who also

PEN SKETCH.

died in a hospital, made a bust of me in terra-cotta, which stands on our landing.

And where are the other busts I have mentioned? Does any one know anything about the one of Dickens? As to that of Mr. Stultz, I had the curiosity, a few months ago, to peep in at the Alms-houses in Kentish Town to inquire about it, but could get little information. The young woman at the lodge said she had never seen it, but she had heard there was one somewhere in a cellar. "Sic transit gloria mundi."

Chapter 3

MORDEN HALL.

III

MORDEN HALL

EVENTS link themselves together so strangely in our memories that the least important seem to crop up unbidden and force themselves upon us. I was debating whether to say anything about my school-days, when the name of Sam Weller called to mind a character who was somewhat akin to him; indeed, he might have been a distant relation, for he had something of the same kind of humour, and his occupation was a similar one, only on a larger scale, for the individual I am reminded of was the boots and general serving-man of the establishment at Morden Hall, in Surrey, where I received the first rudiments of my education.

He was always at work, for he had to clean the knives and forks used by seventy boys, wait at their meals, carry in pails of water to the washing-room, clean all the boots, and look after the horse and trap kept by the headmaster. Still, he was cheerful. I can just remember he had light curly hair, a round, reddish, good-tempered face, and invariably appeared to be in a hurry. When he handed round the bread-and-scrape, great thick hunks, which were piled in heaps on his wooden tray, he ran down the tables as fast as he could, telling the boys he had no time for them to pick and choose. They made darts and grabs at the hunks, and a sort of scramble for their daily bread was the result. At dinner the boys were allowed to choose their meat, either fat or lean, well-done or under-done, and our humorous waiter would constantly bring well-done fat to those who wanted under-done lean, and under-done lean to those who wanted well-done fat. He told me one day, with a very serious countenance, that he was going to leave. When I asked him the reason, he said it was because he had no more "spit" left to clean the boots with. Polly, as he called the housekeeper or mistress, was, he said, so economical that she wouldn't buy blacking, and the consequence was that he was dried up. If the bell rang, he would sing out to a kind of chant or hymn tune, "Coming," skip over the forms, and dance out of the room.

To think, that out of all the inmates of Morden Hall, my memory should only single out the boots, whose very name I forget; especially as the headmaster, Mr. T. N. White, was one of the kindest of men. And I ought, certainly, to pay a tribute to the memory of Mr. H. P. Ashby, who was not only a clever artist, but my first instructor in painting. It was he who, at the giving away of the prizes at the end of a term, made me supremely happy. After all had been distributed, and I was lamenting that there was not one for me, he stepped forward and asked to be allowed to say one or two words. He had what appeared to be a little jewel-case in his hand, and when he held it up I could see it contained a silver palette. After a short speech, which I forget, but which made my heart beat violently, he called me by name and presented the palette to me, amidst the deafening shouts and hoorays of my schoolfellows, which still ring in my ears.

Chapter 4

THE SCHOOLROOM, PARIS.

IV

PARIS

HAVING by no means completed my education at my Surrey school, it was decided to send me to Paris for a couple of years, to a French professor, M. Morand, who kept a sort of mixed establishment, half boarding-house and half school. He prepared young gentlemen for the various examinations they had to pass to enter the École Polytechnique, St. Cyr, &c., and took one or two English pupils, who were partly instructed by himself, and partly by Madame, who was an English lady; and as we all lived together like one big family, the process was described as "Éducation de famille."

I started for Paris at the beginning of the year 1848, in company with a very lively party of ladies, whose merriment prevented me from feeling dull at leaving my native land. Although I had been taught at my Surrey school that everybody and everything in France was very wicked, I was much entertained with the novelty of the whole scene, for in those days there was a greater contrast between France and England than there is now. I shall not attempt an account of a journey which I only dimly remember. The greater part of it was by diligence, the old lumbering coach of the past. We arrived in Paris in the small hours of the morning, and drove to a fine house in the Place Vendôme, where Miss Scott, the lady who stood god-mother at my baptism, had some splendid apartments. I slept on a sofa in one of the drawing-rooms, but was roused from my slumbers by a strange sound, and was rather alarmed to see a man, whom I took for a lunatic, apparently dancing about the room. He, however, set my mind at rest by informing me that he was "Monsieur le frotteur," the floor polisher; and, in fact, he made the floor so shining and slippery that the first thing I did when I attempted to walk across it was to tumble down. He ran to my assistance, and smiled as though he took my little mishap as a compliment to the perfect manner in which he had done his work. I have often thought of that frotteur, and have even built up a sort of theory upon him, which is, that the French, as a rule, are so happy because they take a pride in all they do—or, in other words, because they are artists.

I soon made the acquaintance of my new professor and his wife, Monsieur and Madame Morand, for I left Miss Scott and all her lively young ladies soon after breakfast, and was driven to a house in the Avenue Marbœuf, in the Champs Élysées, a large square building, with no architectural pretensions, standing in its own grounds, which were rather like a small wilderness.

My new friends received me very kindly. Monsieur Morand, the professor, was a short, dark, handsome man, with whiskers and flowing curly locks. He wore a long brown frock-coat, with the cuffs turned back, and occasionally paused in his conversation to take a pinch of snuff. I understood very little of what he said, but Madame Morand acted as interpreter; and my eldest brother (William), who had been with them for some few months and had quite a Frenchified air, acted as cicerone, showed me over the place and introduced me to the other inmates of the schoolroom, two or three young Frenchmen (Alfred, Edmond, and Patrice), who were cramming for their examinations, and a little Spanish-American named Joseph Reynaud, who spoke English like an English boy. Later on, when all the household sat down to dinner, we formed a rather large and pretty lively party.

Besides the pupils, there were some English ladies, and an old General du Bourg, father of Patrice. There were also occasional visitors, especially on Sundays, when our party was increased and enlivened to a considerable extent: among them were politicians and philosophers, such as L'Abbé de Lamennais, author of Les Paroles d'un Croyant, Le Livre du Peuple, &c., who said that truth "was that which all men consented to"; Dr. Bonnet, doctor of the Conciergerie, who told us many strange stories about the prison; Dr. Ducro, a portly man with a deep voice, a sort of French Dr. Johnson; M. Dubois, a young and lively barrister who wanted to marry twenty thousand a year; and a poet, M. Guyard, who afterwards visited England, and was surprised at two things about us—one, that we could on a fine night see the Milky Way, which he had understood was an impossibility in this land of fogs; and the other, that we had such a fine cathedral as Westminster Abbey, which, he said, was a "poem in stone." There was also a Monsieur Barratier, who lived near, and amused us much by his droll speeches, and by his account of a plague of cats that threatened to turn him out of his house and home. Madame Barratier and her sister had a passion for these domestic animals. They began with one, then added two more, all females. Their kittens soon increased in number, as the ladies would not suffer for a moment that even one should be destroyed. Their meals not only added greatly to the house-

DR. BONNET.

hold expenses, but poor Barratier himself often had to take his dinner on the staircase. Human nature, he said, could stand it no longer, and he revolted. He summoned up all his fortitude, and told his wife and her sister that they must get rid of their cats.

"Impossible!!!" they exclaimed.

"I am determined," said he.

"No! no! no!!" said they.

"Or Barratier or the cats," said he. "I give you half-an-hour to decide."

They asked to be allowed to keep two; this was denied them. One, then. "No, Madame, not even one." Finally, the ladies had to give in, the cats were sent away, and Barratier returned to his home and to the bosom of Madame Barratier.

Later on, another visitor came to the house, and passed under the name of Martin. He was very mysterious, kept to his own room, and never went out. He proved to be the celebrated Monsieur Cabet who scandalised the well-to-do Parisians by declaring that "property is theft." He was considered a dangerous character, a sort of cannibal, but was in reality one of the most amiable and gentle of men.

It may be imagined that, with such a company of Frenchmen, the conversations at the dinner-table were always animated, intelligent, and amusing. Monsieur Morand was not only an excellent mathematician, having been professor at the Athénée, but was as full of fun as he was of learning; indeed, so impressed was I with what seemed to me, as a boy, his wonderful talents, that I looked upon him as the greatest man of the universe, to use a French superlative; nor did a kinder soul ever breathe, although he was a red Republican and a friend of M. Cabet. His conversation was always interesting, and his language well chosen, for he spoke the French of Voltaire. Pleasant, indeed, were our many talks as we paced the Bois de Boulogne, then quite a country wood. The works of the amiable Bernardin de St. Pierre were put into my hands, and formed a delightful guide to the Étude de la Nature. My schooling was no longer a difficult task, a painful effort of memory, but an agreeable, even a captivating pursuit.

But this is but a prefatory note which I make here, because it is, as it were, the mise en scène, the background of an event which was of enormous importance to France, and was the first great drama of real life that I had witnessed, namely, the Revolution of 1848.

Chapter 5

SENTINELS.

V

THE REVOLUTION, 1848

I HAD noticed that the conversation at the dinner-table had become more and more animated, especially on Sundays, when our party was increased by some of the visitors mentioned in the last chapter. As I had not yet learnt enough French to understand the ins and outs of the conversation, I could only catch a word here and there, and from the tone and gesture of several of the speakers I fancied they were quarrelling, and even swearing at each other; for now and then a fist would come down on the table to give emphasis to the sentence. Among this babel of voices, such expressions as the following caught my ear: "Nom de Dieu!" "Que diable!" "Sapristi!" "C'est la canaille!" "Des voleurs!" "Le grand imbécile!" "Le vieux poltron!" "Ce Louis Philippe!" "Mouchards!" "Traitres!" "Révolution!" and so on. But in the midst of it there would be much laughter, and there was evidently a contest between the lively high-toned barrister, M. Dubois, and the grave, deep-voiced, but humorous Dr. Ducro, as to which should say the wittiest and most cutting things about the Government. The names of Guizot, Thiers, Lamartine, Cavaignac, Emile de Girardin, Odillon Barrot, Ledru Rollin, Garnier Pages, Louis Blanc, Barbez, and others, constantly recurred, and when afterwards I asked for an explanation of what it all meant, the answer was, "Oh, they were only talking politics." But the old General du Bourg, with his white hair and black moustache, evidently said some unpleasant things, and demanded an explanation of the observations that had been made in his presence. He particularly objected to the epithet "mouchard" (spy) being used so often. This led to an altercation between him and M. Morand, and we heard high words between them after they had gone from the table.

The great event which our friends in the Avenue Marbœuf were discussing was the approaching Revolution of 1848, when Louis Philippe abdicated and made his escape from the Tuileries (as was said at the time), disguised as a footman; and a Provisional Government was established, of which many of the intimate friends of my professor became members—notably Lamartine, the poet, who was President.

In those days I looked upon politics as things that grown-up people talked about as a kind of amusement, but I had no idea what they were. I heard that there was going to be a Revolution, but so neglected had been my education that I did not even know what that was; it seemed to be associated somehow with Catherine-wheels and squibs and General du Bourg. The following extracts from a diary I kept at the time will show how very fresh I was to the subject; indeed, the fact that one of my brother William's pigeons had laid an egg seemed to me of quite as much importance as the abdication of Louis Philippe, the King of the French.

Diaries are apt to include chronicles of the very smallest beer—even those of Pepys and Evelyn do not escape this failing, nor is the "diary of little Adolphus" any exception to the rule;—and but for the fact that it gives a glimpse of the Revolution of February 1848, and the subsequent tragic events of June, I should not have intruded it upon the reader. But as it recalls to the writer very vividly the moving drama enacted in Paris soon after he set foot there, it may prove interesting.

I will begin with a short specimen of the more domestic items included in its pages:—

Feb. 5th, 1848.—A row between General du Bourg and M. Morand.

7th.—The General very insolent.

12th.—M. Dulong gave me my first lesson in painting.

16th.—Heard there was going to be a Revolution. William's pigeons had a young one.

17th.—More high words between the General and M. Morand. Patrice had a fight with the cook; he was walking off with something out of the kitchen.

22nd.—Revolution commenced.

Patrice's fight with the cook seems to have been the beginning of hostilities, a sort of farce or lever de rideau of the drama about to be enacted in Paris. On the 22nd the air seemed heavy with ominous sounds, and there was a great noise of drums beating to arms, the rappel was heard in all directions, which meant that the National Guards were called out, that all the butchers and bakers and candlestick makers had to don their uniforms and to assist in keeping the peace. On the other hand, the working class, le peuple, otherwise the mob, were beginning to break it in good earnest, shouting vociferously, throwing stones, smashing windows and lamps, turning over omnibuses, carriages, cabs, and carts, tearing up the pavements (or rather the roads, which then were paved with stones as big as quartern loaves) to make barricades with, firing off guns, burning houses, bursting in doors and roaring excitedly, "À bas Guizot!" "À bas les Anglais!" "Vive la République!" "Vive la réforme!" and I don't know what all. In fact, I began to think they meant to kill us all, and I was debating in my own mind where I could hide to be out of danger.

Some of the older students went out to see the "noise," but I, with other juveniles, looked at it from an upstairs window, from whence we could see to the end of the Avenue and on to the Champs Élysées. We had plenty to look at, even in our out-of-the-way street, and as night drew on the plot seemed to thicken, the distant sound of drums and musketry was increasing, a babel of voices rose on the air, and we saw a cart pass at the end of the road, full of dead bodies, their white faces lighted by torches, followed by the crowd singing "Mourir pour la Patrie."

Feb. 23rd.—The troops had been passing up and down our Avenue all night, and some attempt had been made at a barricade, but it was thrown down. The morning was comparatively quiet, and M. Morand said it was all over, but still he would not let us go to the Place Vendôme to take our dancing lesson. The fact was, the Revolution was not over, and on the 24th, Thursday, the diary states that the "Revolution was worse than ever." There was a great noise of drums and bugles and musketry, and even what sounded like the booming of cannon. Later on, the statement in the diary is brief but emphatic:—"Revolution finished. Louis Philippe has abdicated and made his escape; the mob threaten to behead him if they catch him, and Guizot too. The Palais Royal has been sacked and burnt; the National Guard have fraternised with the workmen."

So far, my experience of the Revolution had been limited to what I could see of it from an upstairs window of our house, which was considerably removed from the scene of action; but in the afternoon M. Morand seemed to think there was no more danger, and took me, with several others, for a walk down the Champs Élysées. The day was gloomy, even foggy, and the first thing that struck me was to see whole companies of the regulars marching in solemn sadness, with scarcely a musket or a side-arm between them, and just a solitary drummer beating a sort of doleful measure like the Dead March in Saul. They had given up their weapons to the insurgents, with whom they had fraternised, and were going home to their barracks, to find them in flames. We met several regiments, all equally chopfallen. They were even without their cross-belts, and looked like a sombre set of mourners going to a funeral. They had not been victorious; they perhaps didn't want to be, and yet they might have been brooding over their voluntary defeat.

As a contrast to them, we met hundreds of workmen and men in blouses, belted and shakoed and armed to the teeth, but so drunk and lively that one did not apprehend much danger from them. Whether they had been charging at stone walls, or in their rollings and fallings had stabbed their mother earth, I don't know, but many of their bayonets were bent back and hook-shaped, and there were scarcely any that had not some trophy on them; in most cases, it was the round loaf, or two or three or even four round loaves that are served out to the troops, which they had no doubt helped themselves to, when they bravely broke into the undefended barracks and set them on fire.

The buildings that affected me most were those small stations for the "Corps de Garde," standing separately in the Champs Élysées and Tuileries Gardens, that had been occupied by the Garde Municipale, and had been surrounded by the mob and their inmates shot to a man. They were gutted and blackened, and still smouldering. The Municipal Guards were a fine set of fellows, half soldiers, half police, and for some reason were hated by the populace, and were cut down mercilessly, their only chance of escape being to throw away their uniforms and, if possible, put on a blouse or some other disguise.

We had now arrived within a few hundred yards of the Tuileries, and our professor, far from being alarmed for our safety, seemed himself to partake of the excitement of the crowd. In a few minutes more we were in front of one of the large iron gates facing the Rue de Rivoli; it was closed, but M. Morand seemed to be inspired with command, and bade some of the men climb over it and undo the bolts, which was much easier than bursting it in. Up went a couple of young fellows like monkeys, and in a minute or two more the gates opened and in rushed the mob with a deafening shout, and our little party with them.

The sight that presented itself was the strangest I have ever seen, and has remained in my memory almost as vividly as if it were yesterday—and yet it is now fifty years ago. The magnificent apartments of the Palace were soon filled with as strange a set of ruffians as you could meet anywhere; it seemed as if they were all mad or drunk, and yet they were as jolly as sandboys. They seemed positively to revel in destruction, and to yell with delight as they smashed and tore everything to pieces that they came across. There was scarcely a picture that was not cut into ribbons, and ornaments, however costly, were thrown down and broken to atoms. While I was standing in one of the grand apartments, looking on in wonder, a little man, with a sword almost as big as himself, stood in front of a magnificent mirror that reached from the floor to the ceiling; he surveyed it for a moment, and then, as though he were about to storm a town singlehanded, went deliberately up to it, and with one blow of his great cavalry blade shivered it to pieces. As they fell at his feet, he put on a grand air and said "Là!" as if this was one of the greatest deeds he had ever accomplished, and the proudest moment of his life.

This inherent love of destruction seems to be characteristic of the French; wherever their armies have passed through conquered countries they have left this hateful mark behind them. I noticed it particularly in Spain, and in nine cases out of ten, when I came upon the ruins of some fine old building, I was told that the French were the destroyers.