The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862

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And--the list could be extended to an indefinite length--you will learn
more, by going to the Capranica.

At the Metastasio Theatre there was a French vaudeville company,
passably good, attended by a French audience, the majority officers and
soldiers. Here were presented such attractive plays as _La Femme qui
Mord_, or 'The Woman who Bites;' _Sullivan_, the hero of which gets
_bien gris_, very gray, that is, blue, that is, very tipsy, and at the
close, astonishes the audience with the moral: To get tight is human!
_Dalilah_, etc., etc. The French are not very well beloved by the Romans
pure and simple; it is not astonishing, therefore, that their language
should be laughed at. One morning Rome woke up to find placards all
over the city, headed:

FRENCH

TAUGHT IN THIRTY-SIX LESSONS!

Apply to Monsieur SO-AND-SO.

A few days afterward appeared a fearful wood-cut, the head of a jackass,
with his tongue hanging down several inches, and under it, these words,
in Italian: 'The only tongue yet learnt in less than thirty-six
lessons!'

Caper, seated one night in the parquette of the Metastasio, had at his
side a French infantry soldier. In conversation he asked him:

'How long have you been in Rome?'

'Three years, _Mossu_.'

'Wouldn't you like to return to France?'

'Not at all.'

'Why not?'

'Wine is cheap, here, tobacco not dear, the ladies are extremely kind:
_voila tout!_'

'You have all these in France.'

'_Oui, Mossu!_ but when I return there I shall be a farmer again; and
it's a frightful fact that you may plow your heart out without turning
up but a very small quantity of these articles there!'

French soldiers still protect Rome--and 'these articles there.'

THE BEARDS OF ART.

'Can you tell me,' said Uncle Bill Browne to Rocjean, with the air of a
man about to ask a hard conundrum, 'why beards, long hair, and art,
always go together?'

'Of course, art draws out beards along with talent; paints and bristles
must go together; but high-art drives the hair of the head in, and
clinches it. Among artists first and last there have been men with giant
minds, and they have known it was their duty to show their mental power:
the beard is the index.'

'But the beard points downward,' suggested Caper, 'and not upward.'

'That depends----'

'On _pomade Hongroise_--or beeswax,' interrupted Caper.

'Exactly; but let me answer Uncle Bill. To begin, we may safely assert
that an artist's life--here in Rome, for instance--is about as
independent a one as society will tolerate; its laws, as to shaving
especially, he ignores, and caring very little for the Rules of the
Toilette, as duly published by the--_bon ton_ journals, uses his razor
for mending lead-pencils, and permits his beard to enjoy long vacation
rambles. Again: those who first set the example of long beards, Leonardo
da Vinci, for example, who painted his own portrait with a full beard a
foot long, were men who moved from principle, and I have the belief that
were Leonardo alive to-day, he would say:

"My son, and well-beloved Rocjean, _zitto!_ and let ME talk. Know, then,
that I did permit my beard luxuriant length--for a reason. Thou dost not
know, but I do, that among the ancient Egyptians they worshiped in their
deity the male and female principle combined; so the exponents of this
belief, the Egyptian priests, endeavored in their attire to show a
mingling of the male and female sex; they wore long garments like women,
_vergogna!_ they wore long hair, _guai!_ and they SHAVED THEIR FACES! It
pains me to say, that their indecent example is followed even to this
day, by the priests of what should be a purer and better religion.

"_Silenzio!_ I have not yet said my say. Among Eastern nations, their
proverbs, and what is better, their customs, show a powerful protest
against this impure old faith. You have seen the flowing beards of the
Mohammedans, especially the Turks, and their short-shaved heads of hair,
and you may have heard of their words of wisdom:

"'Long hair, little brain.'

"And that eloquent sentence:

"'Who has no beard has no authority.'

"They have other sayings, which I can not approve of; for instance:

"'Do not buy a red-haired person, do not sell one, either; if you have
any in the house, drive them away.'

"I say I do not approve of this, for the majority of the English have
red heads, and people who want to buy my pictures I never would drive
out of my house, _mai!_"

'Come,' said Caper, 'Leonardo no longer speaks when there is a question
of buying or selling. Assume the first person.'

'Another excellent reason for artists in Rome to wear beards is, that
where their foreign names can not be pronounced, they are often called
by the size, color, or shape, of this face-drapery. This is particularly
the case in the Cafe Greco, where the waiters, who have to charge for
coffee, etc., when the artist does not happen to have the change about
him, are compelled to give him a name on their books, and in more than
one instance, I know that they are called from their beards, I have a
memorandum of these nicknames: I am called _Barbone_, or Big-bearded;
and you, Caper, are down as _Sbarbato Inglese_, the Shaved Englishman.'

'Hm!' spoke Caper, 'I an't an Englishman, and I don't shave; my beard
has to come yet.'

'What is my name?' asked Uncle Bill.

'_Puga Sempre_, or He Pays Always. A countryman of mine is called _Baffi
Rici_, or Big Moustache; another one, _Barbetta_, Little Beard; another,
_Barbaccia_, Shabby Beard; another, _Barba Nera_, Black Beard; and, of
course, there is a _Barba Rossa_, or Red Beard. Some of the other names
are funny enough, and would by no means please their owners. There is
_Zoppo Francese_, the Lame Frenchman; _Scapiglione_, the Rowdy;
_Pappagallo_, the Parrot; _Milordo_; _Furioso_; and one friend of ours
is known, whenever he forgets to pay two baiocchi for his coffee, as
_San Pietro_!'

'Well,' said Uncle Bill, 'I'll tell you why I thought you artists wore
long beards: that when you were hard up, and couldn't buy brushes, you
might have the material ready to make your own.'

'You're wrong, Uncle,' remarked Caper; 'when we can't buy them, we get
trusted for them--that's our way of having a brush with the enemy.'

'That will do, Jim, that will do; say no more. None of the artists'
beards here, can compare with one belonging to a buffalo-and-prairie
painter who lives out in St. Louis--it is so long he ties the ends
together and uses it for a boot-jack. Good-night, boys, good-night!'

A CALICO-PAINTER.

Rocjean was finishing his after-dinnerical coffee and cigar, when
looking up from _Las Novedades_, containing the latest news from Madrid,
and in which he had just read _en Roma es donde hay mas mendigos_, Rome,
is where most beggars are found; London, where most engineers, lost
women, and rat-terriers, abound; Brussels, where women who smoke, are
all round--looking up from this interesting reading, he saw opposite him
a young man, whose acquaintance he knew at a glance, was worth making.
Refinement, common-sense, and energy were to be read plainly in his
face. When he left the cafe, Rocjean asked an artist, with long hair,
who was fast smoking himself to the color of the descendants of Ham, if
he knew the man?'

'No-o-oo, I believe he's some kind of a calico-painter.'

'What?'

'Oh! a feller that makes designs for a calico-mill.'

Not long afterward Rocjean was introduced to him, and found him, as
first impressions taught him he would--a man well worth knowing. Ho was
making a holiday-visit to Rome, his settled residence being in Paris,
where his occupation was designer of patterns for a large calico-mill in
the United States. A New-Yorker by birth, consequently more of a
cosmopolitan than the provincial life of our other American cities will
tolerate or can create in their children, Charles Gordon was every inch
a man, and a bitter foe to every liar and thief. He was well informed,
for he had, as a boy, been solidly instructed; he was polite, refined,
for he had been well educated. His life was a story often told:
mercantile parent, very wealthy; son sent to college; talent for art,
developed at the expense of trigonometry and morning-prayers; mercantile
parent fails, and falls from Fifth avenue to Brooklyn, preparatory to
embarking for the land of those who have failed and fallen--wherever
that is. Son wears long hair, and believes he looks like the painter who
was killed by a baker's daughter, writes trashy verses about a man who
was wronged, and went off and howled himself to a long repose, sick of
this vale of tears, et cetera. Finally, in the midst of his despair,
long hair, bad poetry and painting, an enterprising friend, who sees he
has an eye for color, its harmonies and contrasts, raises him with a
strong hand into the clear atmosphere of exertion for a useful and
definite end--makes him a 'calico-painter.'

It was a great scandal for the Bohemians of art to find this
calico-painter received every where in refined and intelligent society,
while they, with all their airs, long hairs, and shares of impudence,
could not enter--they, the creators of Medoras, Magdalens, Our Ladies of
Lorette, Brigands' Brides, Madame not In, Captive Knights, Mandoline
Players, Grecian Mothers, Love in Repose, Love in Sadness, Moonlight on
the Waves, Last Tears, Resignation, Broken Lutes, Dutch Flutes, and
other mock-sentimental-titled paintings.

'God save me from being a gazelle!' said the monkey.

'God save us from being utility calico-painters!' cried the high-minded,
dirty cavaliers who were not cavaliers, as they once more rolled over in
their smoke-house.

'In 1854,' said Gordon, one day, to Rocjean, after their acquaintance
had ripened into friendship, 'I was indeed in sad circumstances, and was
passing through a phase of life when bad tobacco, acting on an empty
stomach, gave me a glimpse of the Land of the Grumblers. One long year,
and all that was changed; then I woke up to reality and practical life
in a 'Calico-Mill;' then I wrote the lines you have asked me about. Take
them for what they are worth.

REDIVIVUS.

MDCCCLVI

'He sat in a garret in Fifty-four,
To welcome Fifty-five.
'God knows,' said he, 'if another year
Will find this man alive.
I was born for love, I live in song,
Yet loveless and songless I'm passing along,
And the world?--Hurrah!
Great soul, sing on!

'He sat in the dark, in Fifty-four,
To welcome Fifty-five.
'God knows,' said he, 'if another year
I'll any better thrive.
I was born for light, I live in the sun,
Yet in, darkness, and sunless, I'm passing on,
And the world?--Hurrah!
Great soul, shine on!'

'He sat in the cold, in Fifty-four,
To welcome Fifty-five.
'God knows,' said he, 'I'm fond of fire,
From warmth great joy derive.
I was born warm-hearted, and oh! it's wrong
For them all to coldly pass along:
And the world?--Hurrah!
Great soul, burn on!'

'He sat in a home, in Fifty-five,
To welcome Fifty-six.
'Throw open the doors!' he cried aloud,
'To all whom Fortune kicks!
I was born for love, I was born for song,
And great-hearted MEN my halls shall throng.
And the world?--Hurrah!
Great soul, sing on!'

'He sat in bright light, in Fifty-five,
To welcome Fifty-six.
'More lights!' he cried out with joyous shout,
'Night ne'er with day should mix.
I was born for light, I live in the sun,
In the joy of others my life's begun.
And the world?--Hurrah!
Great soul, shine on!'

'He sat in great warmth, in Fifty-five,
To welcome Fifty-six,
In a glad and merry company
Of brave, true-hearted Bricks!
'I was born for warmth, I was born for love,
I've found them all, thank GOD above!
And the world?--Ah! bah!
Great soul, move on!''

A PATRON OF ART.

The Roman season was nearly over: travelers were making preparations to
fly out of one gate as the Malaria should enter by the other; for,
according to popular report, this fearful disease enters, the last day
of April, at midnight, and is in full possession of the city on the
first day of May. Rocjean, not having any fears of it, was preparing not
only to meet it, but to go out and spend the summer with it; it costs
something, however, to keep company with La Malaria, and our artist had
but little money: he must sell some paintings. Now it was unfortunate
for him that though a good painter, he was a bad salesman; he never kept
a list of all the arrivals of his wealthy countrymen or other strangers
who bought paintings; he never ran after them, laid them under
obligations with drinks, dinners, and drives; for he had neither the
inclination nor that capital which is so important for a
picture-merchant to possess in order to drive--a heavy trade, and
achieve success--such as it is. Rocjean had friends, and warm ones; so
that whenever they judged his finances were in an embarrassed state,
they voluntarily sent wealthy sensible as well as wealthy insensible
patrons of art to his aid, the latter going as Dutch galliots laden with
doubloons might go to the relief of a poor, graceful felucca, thrown on
her beam-ends by a squall.

One morning there glowed in Rocjean's studio the portly forms of Mr. and
Mrs. Cyrus Shodd, together with the tall, fragile figure of Miss Tillie
Shodd, daughter and heiress apparent and transparent. Rocjean welcomed
them as he would have manna in the desert, for he judged by the air and
manner of the head of the family, that he was on picture-buying bent. He
even gayly smiled when Miss Shodd, pointing out to her father, with her
parasol, some beauty in a painting on the easel, run its point along the
canvas, causing a green streak from the top of a stone pine to extend
from the tree same miles into the distant mountains of the Abruzzi-the
paint was not dry!

She made several hysterical shouts of horror after committing this
little act, and then seating herself in an arm-chair, proceeded to take
a mental inventory of the articles of furniture in the studio.

Mr. Shodd explained to Rocjean that he was a plain man:

This was apparent at sight.

That he was an uneducated man:

This asserted itself to the eyes and ears.

After which self-denial, he commenced 'pumping' the artist on various
subjects, assuming an ignorance of things which, to a casual observer,
made him appear like a fool; to a thoughtful person, a knave: the whole
done in order, perhaps, to learn about some trifle which a plain,
straightforward question would have elicited at once. Rocjean saw his
man, and led him a fearful gallop in order to thoroughly examine his
action and style.

Spite of his commercial life, Mr. Shodd had found time to 'self-educate'
himself--he meant self-instruct--and having a retentive memory, and a
not always strict regard for truth, was looked up to by the
humble-ignorant as a very columbiad in argument, the only fault to be
found with which gun was, that when it was drawn from its quiescent
state into action, its effective force was comparatively nothing, one
half the charge escaping through the large touch-hole of untruth.
Discipline was entirely wanting in Mr. Shodd's composition. A man who
undertakes to be his own teacher rarely punishes his scholar, rarely
checks him with rules and practice, or accustoms him to order and
subordination. Mr. Shodd, therefore, was--undisciplined: a raw recruit,
not a soldier.

Of course, his conversation was all contradictory. In one breath, on the
self-abnegation principle, he would say, 'I don't know any thing about
paintings;' in the next breath, his overweening egotism would make him
loudly proclaim: 'There never was but one painter in this world, and
his name is Hockskins; he lives in my town, and he knows more than any
of your 'old masters'! _I_ ought to know!' Or, '_I_ am an uneducated
man,' meaning uninstructed; immediately following it with the assertion:
'All teachers, scholars, and colleges are useless folly, and all
education is worthless, except self-education.'

Unfortunately, self-education is too often only education of self!

After carefully examining all Rocjean's pictures, he settled his
attention on a sunset view over the Campagna, leaving Mrs. Shodd to talk
with our artist. You have seen--all have seen--more than one Mrs. Shodd;
by nature and innate refinement, ladies; (the 'Little Dorrits' Dickens
shows to his beloved countrymen, to prove to them that not all nobility
is nobly born--a very mild lesson, which they refuse to regard;) Mrs.
Shodds who, married to Mr. Shodds, pass a life of silent protest against
brutal words and boorish actions. With but few opportunities to add
acquirable graces to natural ease and self-possession, there was that in
her kindly tone of voice and gentle manner winning the heart of a
gentleman to respect her as he would his mother. It was her mission to
atone for her husband's sins, and she fulfilled her duty; more could not
be asked of her, for his sins were many. The daughter was a copy of the
father, in crinoline; taking to affectation--which is vulgarity in its
most offensive form--as a duck takes to water. Even her dress was
marked, not by that neatness which shows refinement, but by precision,
which in dress is vulgar. One glance, and you saw the woman who in
another age would have thrown her glove to the tiger for her lover to
pick up!

Among Rocjean's paintings was the portrait of a very beautiful woman,
made by him years before, when he first became an artist, and long
before he had been induced to abandon portrait-painting for landscape.
It was never shown to studio-visitors, and was placed with its face
against the wall, behind other paintings. In moving one of these to
place it in a good light on the easel, it fell with the others to the
floor, face uppermost; and while Rocjean, with a painting in his hands,
could not stoop at once to replace it, Miss Shodd's sharp eyes
discovered the beautiful face, and, her curiosity being excited, nothing
would do but it must be placed on the easel. Unwilling to refuse a
request from the daughter of a Patron of Art in perspective, Rocjean
complied, and, when the portrait was placed, glancing toward Mrs. Shodd,
had the satisfaction of reading in her eyes true admiration for the
startlingly lovely face looking out so womanly from the canvas.

'Hm!' said Shodd the father, 'quite a fancy head.'

'Oh! it is an exact portrait of Julia Ting; if she had sat for her
likeness, it couldn't have been better. I must have the painting, pa,
for Julia's sake. I _must_. It's a naughty word, isn't it, Mr. Rocjean?
but it is so expressive!'

'Unfortunately, the portrait is not for sale; I placed it on the easel
only in order not to refuse your request.'

Mr. Shodd saw the road open to an argument. He was in ecstasy; a long
argument--an argument full of churlish flings and boorish slurs, which
he fondly believed passed for polished satire and keen irony. He did not
know Rocjean; he never could know a man like him; he never could learn
the truth that confidence will overpower strength; only at last, when
through his hide and bristles entered the flashing steel, did he,
tottering backwards, open his eyes to the fact that he had found his
master--that, too, in a poor devil of an artist.

The landscapes were all thrown aside; Shodd must have that portrait. His
daughter had set her heart on having it, he said, and could a gentleman
refuse a lady any thing?

'It is on this very account I refuse to part with it,' answered Rocjean.

It instantly penetrated Shodd's head that all this refusal was only
design on the part of the artist, to obtain a higher price for the work
than he could otherwise hope for; and so, with what he believed was a
master-stroke of policy, he at once ceased importuning the artist, and
shortly departed from the studio, preceding his wife with his daughter
on his arm, leaving the consoler, and by all means his best half, to
atone, by a few kind words at parting with the artist, for her husband's
sins.

'And there,' thought Rocjean, as the door closed, 'goes 'a patron of
art'--and by no means the worst pattern. I hope he will meet with
Chapin, and buy an Orphan and an Enterprise statue; once in his house,
they will prove to every observant man the owner's taste.'

Mr. Shodd, having a point to gain, went about it with elephantine grace
and dexterity. The portrait he had seen at Rocjean's studio he was
determined to have. He invited the artist to dine with him--the artist
sent his regrets; to accompany him, 'with the ladies,' in his carriage
to Tivoli--the artist politely declined the invitation; to a
_conversazione_, the invitation from Mrs. Shodd--a previous engagement
prevented the artist's acceptance.

Mr. Shodd changed his tactics. He discovered at his banker's one day a
keen, communicative, wiry, shrewd, etc., etc., enterprising, etc., 'made
a hundred thousand dollars' sort of a little man, named Briggs, who was
traveling in order to travel, and grumble. Mr. Shodd 'came the ignorant
game' over this Briggs; pumped him, without obtaining any information,
and finally turned the conversation on artists, denouncing the entire
body as a set of the keenest swindlers, and citing the instance of one
he knew who had a painting which he believed it would be impossible for
any man to buy, simply because the artist, knowing that he (Shodd)
wished it, would not set a price on it, so as to have a very high one
offered (!) Mr. Briggs instantly was deeply interested. Here was a
chance for him to display before Shodd of Shoddsville his shrewdness,
keenness, and so forth. He volunteered to buy the painting.

In Rome, an artist's studio may be his castle, or it may be an Exchange.
To have it the first, you must affix a notice to your studio-door
announcing that all entrance of visitors to the studio is forbidden
except on, say, 'Monday from twelve A.M. to three P.M. This is the
baronial manner. But the artist who is not wealthy or has not made a
name, must keep an Exchange, and receive all visitors who choose to
come, at almost any hours--model hours excepted. So Briggs, learning
from Shodd, by careful cross-questioning, the artist's name, address,
and a description of the painting, walked there at once, introduced
himself to Rocjean, shook his hand as if it were the handle of a pump
upon which he had serious intentions, and then began examining the
paintings. He looked at them all, but there was no portrait. He asked
Rocjean if he painted portraits; he found out that he did not. Finally,
he told the artist that he had heard some one say--he did not remember
who--that he had seen a very pretty head in his studio, and asked
Rocjean if he would show it to him.

'You have seen Mr. Shodd lately, I should think?' said the artist,
looking into the eyes of Mr. Briggs.

A suggestion of a clean brick-bat passed under a sheet of yellow
tissue-paper was observable in the hard cheeks of Mr. Briggs, that being
the final remnant of all appearance of modesty left in the sharp man, in
the shape of a blush.

'Oh! yes; every body knows Shodd--man of great talent--generous,' said
Briggs.

'Mr. Shodd may be very well known,' remarked Rocjean measuredly, 'but
the portrait he saw is not well known; he and his family are the only
ones who have seen it. Perhaps it may save you trouble to know that the
portrait I have several times refused to sell him will never be sold
while I live. The _common_ opinion that an artist, like a Jew, will sell
the old clo' from his back for money, is erroneous.'

Mr. Briggs shortly after this left the studio, slightly at a discount,
and as if he had been measured, as he said to himself; and then and
there determined to say nothing to Shodd about his failing in his
mission to the savage artist. But Shodd found it all out in the first
conversation he made with Briggs; and very bitter were his feelings when
he learnt that a poor devil of an artist dared possess any thing he
could not buy, and moreover had a quiet moral strength which the vulgar
man feared. In his anger, Shodd, with his disregard for truth, commenced
a fearful series of attacks against the artist, regaling every one he
dared to with the coarsest slanders, in the vilest language, against the
painter's character. A very few days sufficed to circulate them, so that
they reached Rocjean's ears; a very few minutes passed before the artist
presented himself to the eyes of Shodd, and, fortunately finding him
alone, told him in four words, 'You are a slanderer;' mentioning to him,
beside, that if he ever uttered another slander against his name, he
should compel him to give him instantaneous satisfaction, and that, as
an American, Shodd knew what that meant.

It is needless to say that a liar and slanderer is a coward;
consequently Mr. Shodd, with the consequences before his eyes, never
again alluded to Rocjean, and shortly left the city for Naples, to
bestow the light of his countenance there in his great character of Art
Patron.

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