1162. Benjamin Robert Haydon to EBB
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 6, 340–341.
London
Feby 27th 1843
My dearest Friend,
Why did I put C’est lui?—for something of the same reason Alcibidedes [sic] cut off his Dog’s tail—for fun. [1]
I daresay my folies are a bore[.] The Venus & Anchises I painted for the late Lord de Tabley—& Lady de Tabley [2] liked it so much she made him will it to her[;] she has it now, and I believe it to be one of the prettiest things I ever did—a True Cytherea—— [3]
On dit, [4] I could not make the Duke as well known as Napoleon by his back & a bit of his face[.] I betted I could, & not even show his face—& I have won–
The Athenæum is impertinent enough but it is quite genteel in comparison with the Spectator which is scurrilous in the extreme. [5]
Nothing shows the lamentable state of the Critics [more] than their abuse of this Picture—so far from being huge, it is not bigger than a whole length Portrait, not yet so big as Lawrence’s George IVth, and yet contrasted with the paltry things about it, it looks gigantic–
So they said of my Duke, but it is all a decepted View[.] The Duke was the exact height & so was his Horse—it is the mode & manner of selecting the essential from the superfluous which gives my figures an air of size– I measured Lawrence’s George IVth & it was 7 feet–6 inches high—& yet looked like a small Dandy from the reverse principle—— [6]
I was delighted to hear the success of your beautiful Sonnet– [7]
I love Dogs, but Newfoundlanders & Blood Hounds, which I cant keep– Mary Mitford once gave me a brace of Grey-hounds superb beauties–
I am happy to hear of her success still I shall never be reconciled to her leaving her flowers, & cottage[.] It will destroy the poetry about her to have her in Society here.
I have overworked myself, & am far from well– Take care of yourself for the Summer[.] I shall send for the folios, positively Saturday next–
Ever yours faithfully
B R Haydon
Address: Miss B Barrett / 50 Wimpole St
Publication: EBB-BRH, pp. 38–40.
Manuscript: University of Vermont.
1. See EBB’s query in the previous letter. Plutarch tells how Alcibiades, having “a dog of wonderful size and beauty,” had its tail cut off. When his friends “declared that everybody was furious about the dog and abusive of its owner,” Alcibiades laughed and said “That’s just what I want; I want Athens to talk about this, that it may say nothing worse about me” (Life of Alcibiades, IX, trans. Bernadotte Perrin).
2. John Fleming Leicester, 1st Baron de Tabley (1762–1827), himself a gifted amateur artist, was one of the principal patrons of the British school of painting and sculpture and co-founder of the British Institution for the Encouragement of British Art. His wife was Georgiana Maria (née Cottin, d. 1859).
3. A name given to Aphrodite, the goddess of love, who was supposed to have risen from the waves off the coast of the island of Cythera.
4. “One says.”
5. The Spectator, in its review of the British Institution’s exhibition, said “What Mr. Haydon means by his scarecrow on two pegs, with its back towards you, which he entitles C’est lui, (173,) one may guess by the mounds of Waterloo amongst which it is stuck up; but the figure is no more characteristic of the Duke of Wellington than of any other man” (11 February 1843, p. 139). For comment on “Curtius Leaping into the Gulf,” see letter 1156, note 3. For The Athenæum’s review, see letter 1161, note 7.
6. Haydon obviously felt strongly about adverse comments on the proportions of his canvases, as he wrote to The Times as follows: “I never remonstrate against criticism; I consider every man has a right to express his honest opinion, be it in praise or censure; but when it comes to an accidental assertion which is not a fact, no critic ought to complain of a counter-statement. Your critic last year asserted of the picture … of the Duke, that my representation of both man and horse was gigantic. Will you permit me to state that my portrait of the Duke is, by measurement, the same height as Lawrence’s … and that Copenhagen in the picture was 15 hands high, the exact height of the charger?” (15 February 1843.)
7. i.e., her sonnet on Haydon’s portrait of Wordsworth, reprinted in America (see the previous letter).
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