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NOLLEKENS  AND   HIS   TIMES 


iNDON:      RICHARD     BENTLEY     *     SON,      189*. 


NOLLEKENS 


AND    HIS     TIMES 


BY 


JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH 

Keeper  of  the  Prints  and  Drawings  in  the  British  Museum 


EDITED 

WITH  AN  ESSAY  ON  GEORGIAN  SCULPTURE,  AND 
A  SHORT  ACCOUNT  OF  J.  T.  SMITH 

BY 

EDMUND      G  O  S  S  E 


LONDON 

RICHARD     BENTLEY    AND     SON 

^ttbiislur*  in  ©rbtnars  to  $et  #a.ffstj)  \\\t  tyvczn 

i895 

[All  rig/its  reserved] 


vie* 


*1 


51 


INTROD  UCTION 


This  curious  and  entertaining  work,  which  gives 
so  unique  a  picture  of  the  household  life  of  a  popular 
artist  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  was 
brought  out  in  two  octavo  volumes  by  Colburn  in 
1828.  It  contained,  as  frontispiece,  a  fine  lithograph 
of  Nollekens,  engraved  by  William  Bond  from  a 
drawing  by  John  Jackson,  R.A.  '  A  second  edition, 
revised,  appeared  in  1829,  and  this  has  been  taken 
as  the  text  for  the  present  reprint.  In  this  edition 
Smith  omitted  some  of  his  desultory  anecdotes,  which 
had  no  bearing  whatever  upon  the  life  of  his  hero, 
and,  with  one  exception,  it  has  not  been  thought 
desirable  to  put  them  back  again.  The  two  editions 
have,  however,  been  carefully  collated. 

In  reprinting  the  i  Life  of  Nollekens '  two  changes 
have  been  made,  an  account  of  which  must  here  be 
given.  In  order  to  fill  out  the  second  of  his  volumes, 
J.  T.  Smith  appended  i  Memoirs  of  several  Contem- 
porary Artists,  from  the  time  of  Roubiliac,  Hogarth 
and  Reynolds,  to  that  of  Fuseli,  Flaxman  and  Blake.'' 


214700 


vi  INTRODUCTION 


This  is,  in  reality,  a  separate  contribution  to  litera- 
ture, and  has  no  connection  with  the  '  Life  of 
Nollekens.'  It  is  an  instalment  of  the  same  author  s 
1  Book  for  a  Rainy  Day,'  with  which,'  if  at  all,  it 
should  be  reprinted.  It  is  here  omitted  as  forming 
no  part  of  the  '  Life  of  NollekensJ 

In  the  second  place  J.  T.  Smith  had  the  habit, 
as  his  work  progressed,  of  adding  to  his  manu- 
script reminiscences  which  had  escaped  his  memory 
ivhen  he  was  writing  his  first  draft.  These  he 
printed  as  notes,  although  they  really  form  an 
integral  part  of  the  book.  In  the  present  edition 
these  passages  are  printed  in  the  text,  so  as  not  to 
interrupt  the  reader  s  attention.  Those  which  are 
genuine  illustrative  notes  by  Smith  have  been  left 
where  they  stood,  at  the  foot  of  the  page. 

In  an  appendix  will  be  found  certain  supplemen- 
tary facts,   hitherto   unpublished,  which    the   editor 
owes  to  the  courtesy  of  Miss  Edith  M.  Beechey,  of 
High  House,  Newbury. 

So  little  is  now  remembered  of  the  history  of 
Georgian  sculpture  that  the  editor  has  prefixed  to 
this  reprint  an  essay,  in  which  he  has  endeavoured  to 
collect  what  is  known  about  the  leading  English 
sculptors  between  Roubiliac  and  Flaxman,  and  to 
give  some  of  the  characteristics  of  their  work.  It  is 
hoped  that  this  may  serve  to  help  the  reader  inform- ' 
ing  an  impression  of  the  world  of  art  in  which 
Nollekens  flourished.  No  section  of  the  history  of 
English  talent  has  been  more  unworthily  neglected. 


INTRODUCTION 


In  conclusion,  the  editor  ventures  to  call  attention 
to  the  very  full  index  which  he  has  prepared.  The 
1  Life  of  Nollekens '  has  hitherto  been  a  closed  book 
to  the  compilers  of  topographical  and  biographical 
works,  from  the  difficulty  of  finding  a  fact  or  a 
detail  in  its  copious  pages.  It  is  hoped  that  the 
index  here  published  will  enable  this  compendium  of 
curious  information  to  be  used  conveniently  as  a  booh 
of  reference. 

E.   G. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Introduction       ------  v 

An  Essay  on  English  Sculpture  from  Eoubiliac  to 

Flaxman  (by  Edmund  Gosse)              -             -            -  1 

John  Thomas  Smith       -            -            -            -  21 

Original  Preface           -            -            -            -  27 

nollekens  and  his  tlmes         -            -            -            -  29 

Appendix  -------  417 

Index        -------  419 


AN 

ESSAY  ON  ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 

FEOM  EOUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN. 


The  history  of  English  sculpture  in  the  eighteenth  century 
has  yet  to  be  written,  and  the  materials  for  it  are  now  rare 
and  scattered.  Even  of  Roubiliac  comparatively  little  is 
known ;  and  of  the  other  statuaries,  from  Bird  down  to 
Flaxman,  scarcely  any  personal  data  would  have  been 
preserved  had  it  not  been  for  the  industry  of  John  Thomas 
Smith.  In  the  '  Life  of  Nollekens,'  which  is  here  reprinted, 
and  in  his  '  Anecdotes  of  Several  Artists,'  that  entertaining 
writer  supplied  us  with  desultory  statements  for  which  he 
has  never  yet  received  due  gratitude.  A  brief  and  pre- 
posterous life  of  Bacon,  by  Cecil,  and  a  few  notes  by  Allan 
Cunningham,  almost  exhaust  the  other  sources  of  informa- 
tion on  the  sculptors  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  fast- 
vanishing  works  of  the  artists  themselves,  ravaged  by  fire 
and  flood,  dispersed  often  beyond  the  power  of  re-identifica- 
tion, complete  the  slender  data  on  which  we  can  build  up 
an  idea  of  this  important  group  of  men.  In  the  following 
pages  some  attempt  will  be  made,  in  the  first  place,  to 
rearrange  what  is  known  about  their  lives ;  in  the  second, 
to  bring  the  light  of  modern  criticism  to  bear  on  their 
work,  hitherto  obscured — and  most  unfairly — by  too  im- 
plicit a  trust  in  the  excessive  fastidiousness  of  Flaxman. 
?/*  1 


ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


Little  must  here  be  said,  however,  of  the  exotic  sculptors 
who  flourished  in  England  before  George  III.  ascended  the 
throne.  In  the  central  years  of  the  century,  Roubiliac,  a 
Frenchman,  and  two  Flemings,  Peter  Scheemakers  and 
John  Michael  Rijsbrack,  competed  with  one  another  for 
the  execution  of  public  monuments  in  London.  The  first 
was  an  artist  of  very  considerable  genius,  whose  work  is 
still  highly  appreciated  and  widely  known.  Scheemakers 
and  Rijsbrack  were  men  of  inferior  pretensions,  whose 
shops,  in  Vine  Street  and  in  Vere  Street  respectively,  were 
manufactories  of  sculpture,  in  which  the  former,  at  least, 
was  aided  by  yet  another  Fleming,  Laurent  Delvaux,  who 
soon  returned  to  Belgium.  When  the  Royal  Academy  was 
founded  Roubiliac  had  been  dead  for  six  years.  Schee- 
makers might  well  expect  that  he  would  be  a  foundation 
member.  It  is  not  recorded  that  it  was  disappointment 
that  led  him,  in  the  next  year,  to  return  to  Antwerp.  He 
was  seventy-eight  years  of  age,  and  might  well  wish  to 
retire  from  the  profession.  Rijsbrack  remained  in  England, 
and  he  also  was  overlooked,  dying  above  his  shop  in  Vere 
Street  in  1770.  The  disappearance  of  all  these  men  left 
the  field  completely  free  for  the  appearance  of  a  new 
generation  of  sculptors. 

In  a  queer  copy  of  verses  composed  by  Roubiliac  in 
1761,  the  statuary  had  said,  doubtless  in  tentative  reference 
to  the  new  monarch : 

•  II  ne  f aut  pas  qu'un  Mecenas 
Pour  revoir  le  Siecle  d'Auguste.' 

Next  year  Roubiliac  himself  died,  and  when,  in  1768,  the 
Royal  Academy  looked  about  it  for  foundation  members,  it 
could  only  find  two  sculptors  who  seemed  worthy  to  be 
affiliated  to  the  thirty-eight  painters.  These  were  Joseph 
Wilton  and  Agostino  Carlini,  two  artists  whose  historical 
position  and  unquestionable  merit  call  out  against  the 
complete  obscurity  into  which  their  very  names  have 
fallen. 


FROM  ROUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN 


Of  Wilton,  almost  all  that  we  know  has  been  preserved 
to  us  by  the  industry  of  J.  T.  Smith.  According  to  that 
invaluable  gossip,  he  was  born  in  London  on  July  16,  1722. 
In  order  to  realize  the  important  position  held  in  the 
history  of  our  art  by  Joseph  Wilton,  it  must  be  borne  in 
mind  that  until  his  time  sculpture  in  England  had  mainly 
been  carried  on  by  foreign  modellers  and  carvers  under 
the  direction  of  British  architects.  Cunningham  described 
this  condition  of  things  with  accuracy  and  vivacity  when 
he  said  '  the  architects  dictated  monuments  something  in 
the  mathematical  principles  of  their  profession.  The 
names  of  Kent  and  Gibbs  and  Chambers  appear  upon  our 
public  monuments  as  inventors  of  the  designs,  while  the 
artists  who  executed  them  are  mentioned  as  mere  modelling 
tools  or  chisels,  which  moved  as  they  were  directed  by 
their  architectural  lords -paramount.  Rijsbrack,  Schee- 
makers,  and  even  Roubiliac,  were  fain  to  submit  to  the 
tyranny.  In  truth,  the  architects  of  those  days  were 
mighty  men.  Not  contented  with  planning  the  houses  in 
which  the  nobles  lived,  they  laid  out  the  gardens  in  which 
they  walked,  cooled  their  summer  seats  and  arbours  with 
artificial  cascades,  hung  gods  and  seasons  upon  the  ceilings 
of  their  galleries,  sketched  the  cradles  for  their  children, 
dictated  the  form  and  flowers  of  their  ladies'  dresses,  and, 
following  them  to  the  family  vault,  erected  a  triumphant 
monument  in  honour  of  their  virtues.' 

It  was  the  function  of  Joseph  Wilton  to  rebel  against 
this  tyranny.  He  was  the  first  trained  sculptor  of  English 
birth,  and  he  was  fortunate  enough  to  be  born  to  wealth, 
which  made  him  independent.  His  father  was  a  highly 
successful  manufacturer  of  papier-mache,  who  employed 
several  hundred  persons  in  his  establishments  at  Charing 
Cross  and  near  Cavendish  Square.  It  is  probable  that 
Laurent  Delvaux  had  worked  for  him  while  he  was  in 
England,  for  when  the  young  Joseph  began  to  show  a 
strong  leaning  to  sculpture,  his  father  took  him  over  to 


ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


Nivelles,  in  Brabant,  and  left  him  to  study  with  that  clever 
statuary.  In  1744  Wilton  quitted  Delvaux,  and  proceeded 
to  Paris,  where  he  worked  for  three  years  under  that 
brilliant  sculptor,  Jean  Baptiste  Pigalle,  already,  at  the 
age  of  thirty,  a  recognised  master  of  the  French  school. 
Wilton  gained  the  silver  medal  of  the  Academie  des  Beaux 
Arts,  and  '  acquired  the  power  of  cutting  marble,'  a  mystery 
until  that  time  closed  to  Englishmen.  In  October,  1747, 
he  proceeded  to  Rome. 

For  the  next  eight  years  Wilton  resided  in  Italy,  and 
principally  at  Home  and  Florence.  This  was  a  period  of 
the  most  critical  importance  to  the  art  of  sculpture,  and  it 
is  a  matter  for  regret  that  we  possess  no  record  of  the  effect 
produced  on  the  mind  of  the  young  English  sculptor.  We 
read  that  in  1750  he  received  from  Pope  Benedict  XIV.  the 
Jubilee  gold  medal,  but  we  know  not  how  he  was  affected 
by  the  discoveries  of  ancient  Greek  art  made  at  Hercu- 
laneum  and  at  Poestum,  nor  by  the  literature  of  modern 
archaeology,  which  began  about  that  year  to  glorify  the  art 
of  Greece  and  its  noble  simplicity.  In  Holland  he  had 
probably  seen  the  crowded  and  violent  pediments  of  Arthur 
Quellinus  ;  in  Paris  he  had  been  instructed  by  Pigalle,  that 
1  Phidias-Pigalle,'  as  he  was  called,  who  endeavoured  to 
cultivate  realism  side  by  side  with  le  grand  art ;  in  Italy 
he  was  now  contrasting  the  frenzied  monuments  of  Bernini 
and  Algardi  with  the  sweet  serenity  of  rediscovered  Greek 
sculpture. 

Wilton  left  Italy  in  17  5  5,  and  in  the  following  year 
Winkelmann  published  those  '  Reflections  on  the  Imitation 
of  Greek  Art  in  Sculpture  and  in  Painting '  which  formed 
the  prelude  to  his  great  work  of  archaeological  criticism.  It 
was  a  period  of  agitation,  of  the  new  sculpture  beginning  to 
rise  and  smite  the  old,  during  which  Wilton  served  his 
Italian  apprenticeship.  We  know  that  he  was  deeply 
interested  in  the  antique,  and  that  when  he  was  in 
Florence  he  executed,  in  marble,  many  copies  of  ancient 


FROM  ROUB ILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  5 


statues.  In  his  combination  of  the  old  and  the  new,  of  the 
sculpture  of  the  eighteenth  century  with  that  of  the  neo- 
classic  school  of  the  Eevolution,  Wilton  may  be  compared 
with  a  French  sculptor  who  was  still  a  child  when  the 
Englishman  left  Paris — with  the  ingenious  and  gifted  Pierre 
Julien. 

Wilton  returned  to  London  in  May,  1755,  and  brought 
with  him  a  painter,  Cipriani,  afterwards  the  well-known 
R.A.,  an  architect,  who  was  to  become  Sir  William 
Chambers,  and  a  sculptor,  the  eccentric  Capizzoldi.  The 
latter  made  but  little  mark  in  England,  and  soon  returned 
to  Italy ;  he  was  for  awhile  Wilton's  carver  and  assistant, 
and  he  modelled  the  curious  bas-relief  in  bronze  at  the  base 
of  the  monument  to  General  Wolfe  in  Westminster  Abbey. 
He  would,  nevertheless,  be  forgotten  but  for  a  story  told  by 
Smith : 

1  Capizzoldi,  upon  his  arrival,  took  the  attic  story  of  a 
house  in  Warwick  Street,  Golden  Square,  and,  being  short 
of  furniture,  painted  chairs,  pictures  and  window  curtains 
upon  the  walls  of  his  sitting  -  room,  most  admirably 
deceptive,  so  that  with  two  chairs  and  a  small  table  he 
entertained  a  friend  with  a  breakfast,  on  an  oyster  and  a 
pot  of  porter,  in  a  room  completely  furnished.  At  such 
repasts  my  father  has  frequently  been  his  companion.' 

In  3  758  Wilton  and  Cipriani  were  appointed  by  the 
Duke  of  Richmond  Directors  to  the  Statue  Garden  in 
Privy  Gardens,  and  on  the  accession  of  George  III.  the 
sculptor  became  State  Coach  Carver  to  the  King.  He 
presently  inherited  his  father's  fortune,  and,  in  Smith's 
words,  '  the  edge  of  his  inclination  for  art  was  considerably 
blunted.'  Nevertheless,  in  1768  he  was  made  an  Acade- 
mician, but  he  seems  to  have  taken  far  less  interest  in  the 
corporation  and  in  its  schools  than  did  his  solitary  colleague, 
Carlini.  Wilton  became  a  very  fine  gentleman,  moved  in 
fashionable  society,  executed  a  few  more  busts  and  monu- 
ments, and  became  celebrated  for  his  dinner-parties.     When 


ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


Carlini  died,  Wilton  accepted  the  Keepership  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  and  in  that  capacity  might  be  seen  moving  about 
upon  his  gold-headed  cane,  dressed  in  the  height  of  the 
fashion,  with  a  long-tailed  wig,  and  a  portly  and  dignified 
demeanour.  He  was  a  hospitable,  gentlemanly,  elegant 
man,  but  money  had  killed  the  promising  artist,  whose 
youth  had  been  so  laborious  and  original.  He  died  in  his 
official  apartments  in  Somerset  Place  on  November  25, 1803, 
in  his  eighty-second  year. 

Wilton  has  suffered  great  and  unmerited  neglect.  His 
name  calls  for  revival  as  that  of  an  artist  of  great  learning 
and  high  accomplishment.  Between  Roubiliac  and  Bacon 
he  was  without  a  rival,  and  he  is  not  unworthy  to  be  named 
with  the  one  and  with  the  other.  In  the  eyes  of  Read  and 
other  extravagant  imitators  of  Roubiliac  it  seemed  im- 
possible to  go  too  far  in  the  direction  of  sensational  and 
preposterous  design.  Wilton,  with  his  better  training  and 
more  harmonious  fancy,  saw  that  this  was  the  point  at 
which  the  great  French  sculptor  had  himself  been  led  into 
error,  and  he  cultivated  a  much  calmer  manner.  The  taste 
of  the  age  was  against  him ;  he  was  forced  by  it  to  heap  up 
those  rhetorical  masses  of  urns  and  clouds  and  tombs 
which  we  find  so  vapid.  Nor  was  he  at  any  time  a  great 
master  of  composition.  But  the  more  carefully  we  examine 
his  monuments,  laying  aside  prejudice  and  the  ridicule 
which  successive  generations  have  so  lightly  heaped  upon 
them,  the  more  shall  we  be  convinced  of  the  talent  of 
Joseph  Wilton. 

He  was  at  his  best  when,  full  of  enthusiasm  and  cheered 
by  the  patronage  of  the  young  King,  he  started  in  London 
with  monuments  of  heroic  size.  Such  are  the  '  Holmes ' 
which  he  completed  in  1766  and  the  '  Pulteney  '  of  ]  767. 
Here  we  may  admire  an  extraordinary  detail  of  modelling, 
closely  transferred  from  nature  itself.  Wilton,  we  are  told, 
prided  himself  on  his  anatomy,  and  he  was  justified  in 
so   doing,  since  his  knowledge  of  the  human  body  was 


FROM  ROUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  7 

evidently  superior  to  that  of  any  other  English  sculptor  of 
the  century.  The  delicacy  of  his  treatment  of  the  play  of 
muscles  and  articulations  is  remarkable ;  it  is  sometimes 
almost  pre-Raphaelite  in  its  quaint  precision.  Somewhat 
weak  in  design  Wilton  usually  is.  He  is  always  excellent 
in  execution ;  he  succeeds  in  what  he  aims  at,  and  his 
single  figures  are  distinguished,  learned,  and  often  beautiful. 
He  himself,  and  his  age,  considered  his  huge  monument  to 
Wolfe  to  be  his  masterpiece.  It  is  difficult  to  assent  to 
this  criticism ;  here  the  sculptor  seems  to  have  striven  at 
something  beyond  his  powers.  In  the  first  place,  the 
mixture  of  low  relief  with  figures  in  the  round  is  highly 
unfortunate,  and  the  design,  which  fails  to  interesc,  over- 
powers the  detail  of  the  modelling.  The  lions  at  the  base 
are  ludicrous,  and  there  is  no  escaping  from  them.  Yet 
examination  points  to  much  that  is  admirable  in  the 
'  Wolfe.'  Contemporaries  found  fault  with  the  fact  that 
the  naked  body  of  the  hero  is  supported  by  soldiers  in 
modern  uniform ;  yet  the  convention  could  be  defended, 
even  from  a  realistic  point  of  view,  and  certainly  does  not 
vex  the  eye.  The  way  in  which  the  illumination  of  the 
whole  enormous  structure  is  focussed  on  the  head  and 
shoulders  of  the  dying  general  is  exceedingly  skilful. 

The  'Wolfe,'  however,  though  the  most  famous  of 
Wilton's  productions,  is  far  from  being  the  best.  He  is 
seen  to  greater  advantage  in  calmer  compositions.  He 
loved  to  introduce  angels  into  his  mortuary  monuments, 
and  to  support  them  on  wings  of  rare  beauty  and  novelty. 
The  heads  of  these  spiritual  creations  of  his  have  some- 
times an  almost  Rossetti-like  picturesqueness.  Wilton  re- 
presents the  transition  from  the  brisk  and  realistic  virility  of 
Roubiliac  and  Pigalle  to  the  imagination  of  the  neo-Hellenic 
school,  although  he  shows  no  sign  of  direct  Greek  influence. 
Unhappily,  success  and  worldly  indulgence  made  him 
languid ;  some  of  his  later  work  is  unworthy  of  him.  But 
at  his  best  he  was  a  very  brilliant  and  highly-equipped 


ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


craftsman ;  sometimes  he  seems  almost  worthy  to  be  called 
a  great  artist.  He  affected  an  unusual  height  of  polish  on 
the  surface  of  his  works.  His  busts  are  graceful  and  true, 
but  they  have  neither  the  searching  portraiture  nor  the 
high  distinction  of  those  of  Nollekens. 

Of  Agostino  Carlini,  who  was  also  a  very  clever  artist, 
much  less  has  been  preserved.  He  was  a  native  of 
Genoa,  but  we  do  not  know  when  he  was  born,  nor  how 
he  came  to  distinguish  himself  above  all  the  supple  and 
exotic  modellers  of  his  age.  He  lived  and  died  at  No. 
14,  Carlisle  Street,  Soho,  and  Smith  has  preserved  for 
us  this  vignette  of  his  appearance  late  in  life :  *  When 
Carlini  was  Keeper  of  the  Royal  Academy,  he  used  to 
walk  from  his  house  to  Somerset  Place,  with  a  broken 
tobacco-pipe  in  his  mouth,  and  dressed  in  a  deplorable 
great- coat ;  but  when  he  has  been  going  to  the  Academy 
dinner,  I  have  seen  him  getting  into  a  chair,  full  dressed 
in  a  purple  silk  coat,  scarlet  gold-laced  waistcoat,  point- 
lace  ruffles,  and  a  sword  and  bag.'  Carlini  died  on  August 
16,  1790. 

This  is  all  that  is  known  about  Carlini,  whose  works 
have  disappeared  almost  as  completely  as  his  memory,  the 
Royal  Academy  itself  not  having  preserved  that  equestrian 
statue  of  George  III.  which  he  presented  to  it  as  his 
diploma  work  in  1769.  And  yet  Carlini,  so  far  as  can  now 
be  discerned,  was  an  admirable  sculptor.  His  busts  show 
the  influence  of  Roubiliac  in  a  modelling  that  is  rather 
hard  and  dry,  but  masterly  in  style.  His  head  of  George  III. 
at  Burlington  House  is  a  delightful  work,  the  carving  extra- 
ordinarily fine,  the  drapery,  if  a  little  too  tight  and  mannered 
in  the  fashion  of  the  time,  well  expressing  the  buoyant 
folds  of  silk,  the  treatment  of  the  hair  varied,  the  silhouette 
dignified  and  distinguished. 

The  opening  of  the  schools  of  the  Royal  Academy  in 
1769  was  the  signal  for  a  complete  revival  of  the  arc  of 
sculpture  in  England.     That  two  successive  Keepers  should 


FROM  ROUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN 


have  been  sculptors  must  have  greatly  fostered  the  study 
of  that  art,  since  it  is  the  Keeper  who  has  the  direction 
of  the  schools  of  the  Royal  Academy.  Among  the  young 
men  who  were  the  earliest  to  take  advantage  of  the  en- 
couragement given  to  modellers  were  Bacon,  Banks,  and 
Nollekens,  destined  to  be  the  leading  English  sculptors  of 
the  next  generation.  Of  these  the  first-mentioned  was 
the  youngest,  but  the  one  who  earliest  attained  wealth 
and  eminence.  It  may,  therefore,  be  convenient  to  speak 
first  of  John  Bacon. 

Like  not  a  few  later  sculptors  of  distinction,  Bacon  came 
to  the  schools  of  the  Royal  Academy  from  pottery 
works.  Born  on  the  24th  of  November,  1740,  the  son  of  a 
Somerset  man  of  fallen  fortunes,  he  was  apprenticed  for 
eight  years,  at  the  age  of  fourteen,  to  the  well-known 
manufacturer  of  china  shepherdesses  —  Crispe,  of  Bow 
Churchyard.  Crispe's  pottery  furnace  was  at  Lambeth, 
and  thither  the  boy  took  the  small  clay  models  which  were 
to  be  burned.  In  process  of  time  he  made  such  models 
himself — little  rude  figures  of  animals  and  persons.  He  was 
still  a  labourer  at  the  potteries  when,  in  1758,  he  carried 
a  clay  model — '  a  small  figure  of  Peace,  after  the  manner  of 
the  antique  ' — to  the  Society  of  Arts.  He  received  the 
prize  of  ten  pounds,  and  was  from  this  time  forth  a 
constant  recipient  of  the  premiums  of  the  society  until 
the  Royal  Academy  was  formed.  Bacon  entered  the 
schools,  but  his  knowledge  was  already  considerable,  and 
he  received  in  1769  the  first  gold  medal  ever  given  by  the 
Academy.  Next  year  he  was  elected  A.R.A.  All  this 
while  he  was  still  a  labourer.  He  is  said  to  have  invented 
a  species  of  artificial  stone,  called  lithodipra,  on  which  a 
manufacturer  at  Lambeth  expended  some  capital  in  1769  ; 
this  product  became  extremely  popular,  and  for  at  least 
ten  years  Bacon  was  the  principal  workman.  Nichols,  the 
historian  of  Lambeth,  writing  in  1784,  speaks  of  the 
Artificial  Stone  Factory  in  these  terms :  '  Here  are  statues 


io  ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


which  are  allowed  by  the  best  judges  to  be  masterpieces 
of  art,  from  the  models  of  that  celebrated  artist,  John 
Bacon.'  Before  Bacon  left  this  establishment,  the  young 
Flaxman  was  finding  employment  there. 

The  character  of  Bacon  was  a  singular  one.  In  Smith's 
portraiture  of  Nollekens,  we  see  a  rough,  uncultured  spirit 
achieving  success  by  a  blunt  adhesion  to  the  truth — a 
quaint,  and  even  attractive,  disdain  for  the  conventions 
of  society.  His  eminent  fellow-student  and  precursor  in 
the  Royal  Academy  disdained  nothing.  He  was  a  born 
courtier,  and  unmatched  in  the  art  of  saying  soft,  in- 
sinuating things.  He  glided  imperceptibly  into  fame  and 
fortune,  nattering  and  conciliating  everybody  who  could 
help  him,  giving  no  offence  to  any  man  of  influence.  That 
he  might  avoid  the  unseemly  trick  of  spirting  water  from 
his  mouth  on  to  the  clay,  as  had  hitherto  been  done,  Bacon 
invented  a  silver  syringe  for  the  purpose,  and  used  it  first 
when  he  first  obtained  a  sitting  from  the  King.  His  address, 
which  was  simple  and  graceful,  without  obsequiousness, 
delighted  George  III.,  who  asked  him:  'Bacon,  have  you 
studied  in  Rome  ?  Did  you  learn  your  art  out  of  England?' 
1 1  have  never  been  out  of  your  Majesty's  dominions,'  was 
the  reply.  '  I  am  glad  of  it — I  am  glad  of  it,'  answered 
the  King ;  '  you  will  be  the  greater  honour  to  us.' 

This  seems  to  have  occurred  about  1774,  and  for  the 
next  quarter  of  a  century  the  success  of  Bacon  was 
assured.  In  sixteen  public  competitions  for  monuments, 
he  was  successful  fifteen  times.  He  became  an  exceedingly 
wealthy  man,  and  as  he  rose  he  became  more  and  more 
humble.  As  he  gained  the  attention  of  the  public,  he  lost 
the  friendship  of  his  friends.  He  was  accused,  not  without 
cause,  of  trying  to  secure  a,  monopoly  of  the  public  sculp- 
ture of  the  country ;  and  when  he  had  the  face  to  propose 
to  the  Government  to  do  all  the  national  monuments  at  a 
percentage  below  the  Parliamentary  price,  there  was  an 
outcry  among  his  fellow- artists.     '  Spirit  of  Phidias !'  said 


FROM  ROUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  ir 

Fuseli,  '  Bacon  is  to  do  all  the  stonework  for  the  navy  and 
army — they  ought  also  to  give  him  the  contract  for  hams 
and  pork!'  Bacon  smiled  a  still  humbler  smile,  and 
turned  away  from  his  rude  colleagues.  He  had  always 
been  a  pious  man,  and  as  he  grew  older  he  grew  more 
sanctimonious  still.  When  the  sculptors  asked  their 
brother — *  the  presumptuous  potter,'  as  they  called  him — 
what  he  meant  by  his  proposal,  he  murmured  that  his 
desire  was  '  to  employ  monumental  sculpture  to  an  impor- 
tant moral  purpose.'  He  wrote  hymns,  he  preached 
sermons,  he  distributed  epitaphs,  and  parables  and  admo- 
nitions ;  meanwhile,  he  was  amassing  a  very  large  fortune. 
When  he  died,  suddenly  and  prematurely,  on  August  4, 
1799,  he  asked  to  be  buried  in  Whitefield's  Tabernacle,  and 
to  have  this  inscription  plainly  carved  above  him  :  '  What 
I  was  as  an  artist  seemed  to  me  of  some  importance  while 
I  lived ;  but  what  I  really  was  as  a  believer  in  Christ  Jesus 
is  the  only  thing  of  importance  to  me  now.'  That  Bacon 
was  not  sincere,  it  would  be  unfair  to  insinuate.  But  he 
was  a  very  odd  mixture  of  piety  and  business,  and  the 
god  he  worshipped  was  a  sort  of  Chadband- Apollo.  The 
most  cruel  thing  said  of  him  was  that  '  he  was  charitable 
at  least  in  theory.'  That  sculpture  had  not  been  an  un- 
profitable pursuit  to  'the  humble  cutter  of  stone,'  as  he 
was  wont  to  call  himself,  may  be  gathered  from  the  fact 
that  he  left  £60,000  behind  him. 

Bacon  wTas  the  first  English  sculptor  to  get  free  from  the 
tradition  of  Roubiliac,  with  his  boisterous  lights  and  shades, 
his  excessive  under-cutting,  and  his  dependence  upon 
exaggerated  emphasis  of  style.  His  forms  are  far  more 
generous  than  even  those  of  Wilton,  and  he  bases  his 
effects  upon  a  broader  system  of  illumination.  In  looking 
at  a  successful  monument  by  Bacon,  we  find  evidences  of 
an  eye  accustomed  to  consider  the  general  superficies  of 
a  work  of  art,  not  the  picturesqueness  of  its  details.  He 
was  well  fitted  b}^  his  long  and  conscientious  training,  and 


ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


by  the  sobriety  of  his  temperament,  to  excel  in  the  art  of 
monumental  sculpture.  His  love  for  nature  and  for  truth 
was  great ;  his  anatomical  science,  though  more  superficial 
than  that  of  Wilton,  was  considerable,  and  he  was  exceed- 
ingly skilful  in  all  the  technical  processes  of  his  art.  He 
deserves  special  recognition  as  the  inventor  of  the  pointing 
instrument,  which  has  now  entirely  superseded  the  old 
practice  of  pointing  by  compasses  or  calipers. 

His  bust  of  '  Sickness,'  deposited  with  the  Royal  Academy 
in  1778,  an  attenuated  head,  very  finely  wrought,  is  a  little 
mannered  in  its  detail.  But  in  his  monument  to  Chatham, 
in  Westminster  Abbey,  Bacon  showed  for  the  first  time  how 
great  an  artist  he  was.  Of  all  the  huge,  pyramidal  monu- 
ments of  the  age,  this  is  the  most  accomplished,  and  the 
more  carefully  it  is  examined  the  more  admirable  it  will 
be  found.  Chatham,  in  the  ordinary  dress  of  the  period, 
advancing  an  arm  and  a  thin  leg  in  a  somewhat  rhetorical 
pose,  dominates  the  design ;  and  this  figure  is  excellent  in 
realism,  in  the  careful  study  of  nature.  Lower  down,  the 
Muses,  reclining  in  gracefully  balanced  poses  on  the  sarco- 
phagus, are  full  of  beauty — the  forms  and  drapery  classical, 
yet  individualized  and  made  personal.  Their  draperies,  it 
will  of  course  be  observed,  are  papery  and  thin.  This  was 
an  error  out  of  which  Bacon  was  to  grow. 

He  was  improving  to  the  last.  His  monument  to  Halifax, 
with  the  keen  portrait-bust  supported  by  beautifully 
modelled  children,  dates  from  1782.  It  is  an  excellent 
work,  but  the  true  masterpieces  of  Bacon  are  those  on 
which  he  was  engaged  during  the  last  decade  of  his  life. 
The  soft  female  figure,  wonderfully  carved,  that  lies 
stretched  in  all  the  abandonment  of  grief  over  the  tomb 
of  Brigadier  Hope,  a  monument  executed  in  1793,  is  full 
of  beauty ;  but  Bacon  is  seen  at  his  very  best  in  one  of  his 
latest  productions,  the  monument  to  Sir  George  Pocock, 
executed  in  1796.  Here  his  touch,  his  whole  manner, 
curiously  reminds   us    of   Dubois   and    the   great  French 


FROM  ROUBTLIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  13 

masters  of  five- and-t wen ty  years  ago.  Nothing,  it  is  safe 
to  say,  was  seen  in  England  so  broadly  treated,  so  full  of 
mingled  mastery  and  grace,  until  Alfred  Stevens  made  his 
appearance.  Bacon  is  always  Roman,  and,  by  sympathy, 
French;  the  Hellenic  sentiment  never  touched  him,  and  it 
was  to  his  resolute  retention  of  the  old  types  that  was  due, 
we  are  forced  to  suppose,  the  strange  injustice  done  to  him 
by  Flaxman.  The  truth  is,  and  it  should  be  distinctly 
said,  that  Bacon  deserves  to  be  ranked  among  the  greatest 
of  English  sculptors. 

There  could  be  no  greater  contrast  than  between  Bacon 
and  Banks.  The  one  was  a  realist  in  his  art,  a  fanatic  in 
religion;  the  other  was  an  idealist  and  a  pagan,  always 
dreaming  about  beauty,  always  aspiring  towards  an  im- 
possible altitude  of  delicacy  and  distinction.  Thomas 
Banks  was  born  in  Lambeth  on  December  22,  1735.  At 
the  age  of  fifteen  he  was  apprenticed  to  a  wood-carver,  and 
in  1761,  the  year  before  Roubiliac  died,  he  began  to  study 
from  the  life  in  the  St.  Martin's  Lane  Academy.  The 
subjects  of  his  early  basso-relievos,  the  titles  of  which  have 
come  down  to  us,  show  that  from  the  first  Banks  was 
captivated  by  the  romance  of  Greek  mythology.  He  ran, 
at  first,  neck  and  neck  with  Nollekens  and  Bacon,  the 
three  young  sculptors  gaining  the  gold  medal  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  which  was  not  then,  as  now,  biennially  granted, 
in  quick  succession.  But  in  1772,  Banks  having  gained 
the  travelling  studentship,  the  Academicians  sent  him  to 
Rome  at  their  expense,  Carlini  giving  him  a  letter  of  intro- 
duction to  Capizzoldi,  who  had  by  this  time  returned  home. 
The  grant  from  the  Royal  Academy  lasted  three  years  ; 
Banks  was  instructed  by  Capizzoldi  in  the  art  of  carving 
in  marble,  and  lingered  on  in  Rome  at  his  own  expense. 
He  had  already  married,  probably  in  1765,  a  lady  of  con- 
siderable property,  and  this  was  a  most  fortunate  circum- 
stance, for  Banks  had  no  commercial  instinct,  and  was 
rarely  successful  in  selling  a  statue. 


14  ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 

In   1779  Banks  returned   to  England,  but   found   that, 
while  he  had  been  dreaming  among  the  ruins  of  antiquity, 
his  two  old  fellow-students  had  made  a  clientele  for  them- 
selves at  home.     He  announced  his  willingness  to  execute 
monuments,  but  the  commissions  were  given  to  Bacon ;  he 
suggested  busts,  but  the  sitters  were  all  pledged  to  Nolle- 
kens.     Finding  it  impossible  to  obtain  employment,  he  set 
out  for  Russia,  taking  with  him  a  finished  marble  statue  of 
Cupid  catching  a  moth  on  his  wing,  which  was  fortunate 
enough  to  attract  the  admiration  of  the  Empress  Catherine. 
He  stayed  in  St.  Petersburg  for  some  two  years,  and  is  said 
to  have  been  frightened  back  by  an  appalling  commission 
laid  upon  him  by  the  Empress,  nothing  less  than  a  marble 
group  allegorical  of  the  Armed  Neutrality.     He  exhibited 
in   the   Royal   Academy   a  design,   in   low   relief,    of  the 
1  Frenzied  Achilles,'  and  in  1784  a  statue  of  heroic  size  of 
the   same  subject.     This  figure  was  greatly  admired  but 
never  executed,  and  the  original  plaster,  after  many  vicissi- 
tudes, has  at  last  found  an  asylum  in  Burlington  House. 
That   same   year   Banks   was  elected  A.R.A.,  an   honour 
that  had  many  years  earlier  been  bestowed  upon  Bacon 
and   upon   Nollekens.     He   became  a  full   R.A.   in  1785. 
The   remainder   of  the   life   of  Banks  was  passed  almost 
without  incident,  in  the   reverie  of    a  sincere  and  poetic 
artist.     He  found  a  patron  at  last  in  Mr.  Johnes,  of  Hafod, 
whose  house  in  Cardiganshire  he  adorned  with  a  succession 
of  heroic  figures  in  marble.     Unhappily,  Hafod  was  after- 
wards burned  down,  and  some  of  Banks'  noblest  produc- 
tions perished  in  the  flames.     Banks  died  on  February  2, 
1805,  and  is  buried  at  Paddington. 

As  a  monumental  artist,  as  an  executant  altogether, 
Banks  cannot  be  compared  with  Nollekens  or  Bacon.  His 
groups  do  not  hold  together.  His  great  cenotaph  to  Sir 
Eyre  Coote,  with  its  ambitious  Indian  scheme,  is  an 
appalling  failure.  In  this  the  chief  interest  centres 
around   a  great   towering  palm-tree,  apparently  made   of 


FROM  ROUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  15 

indiarubber,  absurdly  posed  in  the  centre  of  the  composi- 
tion. These  things  of  Banks'  are  very  poor,  and  his  bas- 
reliefs,  which  the  school  of  Westmacott  admired,  are 
meagre  and  rude.  But  when  he  had  an  opportunity  of 
giving  rein  to  his  fancy,  and  to  his  instinct  for  selected  human 
beauty,  Banks  produced  works  of  considerable  sentimental 
grace.  In  1786  he  deposited  with  the  Royal  Academy  a 
'  Falling  Giant,'  which  may  still  be  admired.  The  pose  of 
this  figure,  rolling  topsy-turvy  among  a  cascade  of  rocks, 
opened  up  new  possibilities  in  arrangement  of  the  model. 
Here,  and  elsewhere,  in  his  ideal  statues,  Banks  showed 
some  sense  of  the  Greek  imagination.  Here,  for  instance, 
the  scale  of  the  giant  is  naively,  but  effectively,  suggested 
by  a  tiny  group  of  a  satyr  and  two  goats  dancing  in  the 
shade  of  his  gigantic  limbs. 

Banks  excelled  in  languid  monuments  which  insisted  on 
the  pathos  of  early  death.  Of  these  the  most  famous  is 
that  erected  to  Penelope  Boothby  in  the  church  of  Ash- 
bourne, in  Derbyshire.  Queen  Charlotte  burst  into  tears 
when  she  saw  this  work  exhibited  at  the  Royal  Academy, 
and  this  class  of  his  productions  achieved  popularity.  But 
his  real  force  lay  in  Greek  compositions.  There  exists  a 
statuette  of '  Achilles  Arming,'  which  is  singularly  vigorous 
in  technique,  though  not  carried  very  far.  It  was,  indeed, 
in  completing  his  work  that  Banks  was  apt  to  fail.  He 
was  a  capital  draughtsman ;  the  Royal  Academy  possesses 
a  very  fine  life-sized  chalk  study  of  a  head  by  him. 

In  all  Banks'  poetic  figures  we  see  the  reconstituted 
ideal,  made  up  of  recollected  fragments  of  antique 
statuary,  and  it  is  dangerous  to  praise  his  work  without 
being  certain  whence  he  obtained  the  beauty  of  it.  He  was 
not  a  sufficiently  faithful  student  of  nature  to  be  trusted  to 
prefer  it  to  some  reminiscence  of  antiquity,  and,  to  confess 
the  truth,  for  all  his  theoretic  pretensions,  he  was  to  the 
end  of  his  days  but  a  somewhat  inefficient  craftsman. 

Of  Joseph  Nollekens  it  would  be  needless  to  say  much 


1 6  ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 

more  than  will  be  found  in  the  caustic  but  graphic  and 
faithful  pages  of  his  candid  biographer.  One  vignette  may 
be  added  to  the  series  of  Smith's  vigorous  portraits.  This 
is  how  Nollekens  struck  Allan  Cunningham,  who  saw  him 
in  1819  : 

'  He  was  then  unable  to  move  but  by  the  aid  of  his 
attendants,  and,  having  expressed  a  wish  to  Chantrey, 
whom  he  admired  and  loved,  to  see  the  exhibition  of  paint- 
ing and  sculpture,  he  was  carried  upstairs  in  a  kind  of  sedan, 
and  with  his  friend  at  his  elbow  sat  for  a  time  looking 
round  him.  He  then  fixed  his  eye  on  some  work  which 
pleased  him — muttering  a  few  almost  inaudible  words — 
moved  with  his  body  in  the  direction  of  his  object,  and 
made  a  sign  when  he  was  placed  in  the  right  point  of  view. 
His  power  of  expressing  what  he  felt  was  never  strong — it 
was  less  than  ever  now — but  his  good  taste  was  in  full 
vigour,  for  he  caused  himself  to  be  placed  before  all  the 
best  paintings,  and  his  remarks  went  at  once  to  their  chief 
merits.  .  .  .  When  he  was  borne  to  his  coach  he  gave  the 
persons  who  had  helped  him  a  guinea  each,  put  his  hand 
to  his  hat,  and  bade  farewell  for  ever  to  the  Royal  Academy. 
He  was  then  eighty-two  years  old.' 

Nollekens  attempted  every  species  of  sculpture,  but  he 
succeeded  pre-eminently  in  only  one,  the  bust.  His  poetic 
groups  and  reliefs  show  no  native  sense  of  grace ;  his 
Cupids  and  his  Psyches  roll  heavy  heads  at  one  another, 
with  Boeotian  clumsiness ;  his  monuments  are  broken  with 
trivial  eccentricities,  and  are  piles  of  -detail  rather  than 
compositions.  His  '  Three  Captains  of  Rodney's '  was 
executed  in  direct  rivalry  with  Bacon's  '  Chatham,'  and 
invites  comparison  with  it.  But  it  is  in  altogether  a  lower 
plane  of  art.  Instead  of  the  broad  simplicity  of  Bacon,  we 
find  the  composition  crowded  with  undignified  accessories, 
wanting  in  dignity,  and  even  absurd  in  its  attempted 
realism  of  the  three  portraits  hung  on  a  naval  trophy, 
through  which  real  ships  of  George  III.'s  navy  are  sailing. 


FROM  ROUB ILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  17 


Much  better  are  the  elegant  and  effective  three-quarter 
reliefs  of  Nollekens,  where  a  difficult  task  is  gracefully  and 
skilfully  performed.  But  it  is  in  his  century  or  so  of  vivid 
busts  that  Nollekens  takes  his  place  among  the  leading 
artists  of  the  eighteenth  century.  We  cannot  precisely 
call  them  unaffected,  but  they  have  a  life-like  look  and  a 
distinction  of  style  which  are  wholly  admirable.  His  por- 
traits include,  as  will  be  seen  by  the  list  appended  to  this 
biography,  most  of  the  remarkable  characters  of  the  close 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  A  collection  of  them  would  form 
a  singularly  interesting  illustration  of  the  political,  social 
and  intellectual  life  of  London  under  George  III.  Each  is 
vigorously  portrayed,  with  some  little  mannerism,  indeed,  but 
with  real  vitality,  as  he  or  she  was,  and  this  happy  realism 
is  Nollekens'  great  and  lasting  claim  to  our  admiration. 

A  fourth  sculptor,  contemporary  with  Bacon,  Banks  and 
Nollekens,  was  Giuseppe  Ceracchi,  who  came  to  England 
in  1773,  and  was  employed  in  bas-relief  work  by  Adam, 
and  other  architects.  To  him,  in  all  probability,  is  due 
much  of  the  beautiful  relief- work  we  admire  in  the  domestic 
decoration  of  Adam's  houses.  He  was  the  master  of  the 
Hon.  Mrs.  Damer,  and  at  one  time  found  a  great  deal  of 
employment  in  London.  But  he  was  of  a  restless  spirit,  and 
soon  migrated  to  Paris,  where  he  was  concerned,  in  1801,  in 
a  plot  to  assassinate  Napoleon.  Being  condemned  to  death, 
he  was  dragged  to  the  guillotine,  dressed  as  a  Roman 
Emperor,  in  a  classical  car  which  he  had  himself  designed. 

It  was  long  before  a  new  generation  of  sculptors  arose, 
with  Flaxman  at  their  head.  Among  the  few  names  which 
arrest  us  in  the  interval,  two  attract  notice  for  the  pathos 
of  their  lives  and  the  singularity  of  their  manners.  John 
Deare  is  principally  remembered  by  what  Smith,  who  knew 
him  well,  has  preserved  about  his  career.  He  was  born  in 
Liverpool  in  1759.  He  was  a  prodigy  of  early  talent,  and 
made  a  wooden  copy  of  the  skeleton  of  an  adult  person, 
with  his  penknife,  at  the  age  of  ten  years.     In  considera- 

2 


1 8  ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 

tion  of  his  skill  he  was  taken,  when  only  sixteen,  into  the 
employment  of  Thomas  Carter,  an  old-fashioned  but  popular 
statuary,  who  had  been  the  earliest  employer  of  Koubiliac. 
The  exquisite  precision  of  Deare's  work  was  admired  from 
the  first,  and  when  he  was  only  twenty  he  gained  the  gold 
medal  of  the  Royal  Academy  for  a  group  of  \  Adam  and 
Eve.'  A  number  of  Deare's  letters  have  been  preserved, 
and  give  a  valuable  series  of  impressions  of  the  habits  of  a 
young  sculptor  of  that  time.  Bacon  was  pleased  to  patronize 
him,  and  in  1783  he  was  astonished  at  his  own  prosperity. 

In  1785  the  Royal  Academy,  greatly  impressed  with  the 
genius  and  industry  of  Deare,  sent  him  to  Italy.  Here  he 
immediately  found  employment,  and  won  the  ecstatic 
admiration  of  Canova.  Had  he  returned  to  England,  he 
would  certainly  have  been  immediately  elected  an  A.R.A., 
but  he  married  '  a  clever  little  Roman  girl,  who  is  at  least 
my  equal,'  and  adopted  the  Italian  style  of  living.  Deare 
habitually  overworked  himself,  and  was  extremely  nervous 
and  eccentric.  He  was  always  saying  his  prayers,  and  as 
he  believed  it  right  never  to  pray  unless  in  a  stark-naked 
condition,  these  orisons  were  injurious  to  his  health.  He 
went  further,  and  being  convinced  that  he  would  gain 
inspiration  by  spending  the  night  sleeping  on  a  block  of 
marble  before  he  began  to  carve  it,  he  caught  a  violent 
cold,  and  died  at  Rome  on  August  17,  1795. 

Another  youog  man  of  genius,  carried  off  untimely,  was 
Thomas  Procter,  born  at  Settle,  in  Yorkshire,  in  1753.  He 
lost  a  great  deal  of  time  in  trying  to  be  a  painter,  but 
when  at  length  he  began  to  model,  he  astonished  the 
studios.  He  caused  a  sensation  by  producing  a  statue  of 
'Ixion  on  the  Wheel,'  which  Reynolds  persuaded  Sir 
Abraham  Hume  to  buy.  This  encouraged  Procter  to 
produce  a  large  group  of  *  Diomed  devoured  by  his  Horses,' 
which  contemporary  critics  speak  of  in  terms  of  the  highest 
praise.  Unfortunately,  he  did  not  get  a  commission  for 
this  elaborate  work,  which  had  occupied  him  twelve  months, 


FROM  ROUBILIAC  TO  FLAXMAN  19 

and  in  a  fit  of  despondency  he  destroyed  his  model.  The 
Academicians,  admiring  his  talents  and  desiring  to  help 
him,  determined,  in  1793,  to  send  him  to  Rome,  but  Procter 
could  not  be  discovered.  Benjamin  West  undertook  to 
search  for  him,  and  found  him  at  length,  dying  of  starvation 
and  disappointment,  in  an  attic  in  Clare  Market.  Help  came 
too  late,  and  a  few  days  later  the  interesting  artist  died. 

Associated  as  a  student  with  Deare  and  Procter,  but 
more  fortunate  in  his  fate,  was  John  Charles  Felix  Rossi,  a 
man  who,  notwithstanding  his  exotic  name,  was  of  English 
birth,  although  of  Italian  descent.  He  was  born,  the  son 
of  a  physician,  at  Nottingham,  in  1762.  He  early  showed 
a  love  of  statuary,  and  was  placed  under  an  Italian  sculptor 
in  London,  from  whom  he  passed  to  the  schools  of  the 
Royal  Academy.  In  1785  he  gained  a  travelling  student- 
ship, and  went  to  Rome,  returning  to  England  three  years 
later.  He  became  an  A.R.A.  in  1798,  shortly  before  the 
death  of  Bacon,  to  much  of  whose  monumental  work  he 
succeeded.  He  is  best  known  by  a  series  of  military  monu- 
ments in  St.  Paul's  Cathedral.  Rossi  outlived  his  popu- 
larity, and  retired  from  the  Academy  on  a  pension.  He 
did  not  die  until  1839. 

It  is  very  difficult  to  express  an  opinion  on  the  work  of 
Rossi,  for  the  simple  reason  that  he  employed  Italian 
carvers  so  clever  that  they  took  most  of  the  individuality 
out  of  his  modelling.  His  taste  was  classical,  without  any 
real  leaning  to  the  neo- Hellenic  school  of  Banks,  Flaxman, 
and  Deare.  His  bust  of  Lord  Thurlow,  at  Burlington 
House,  is  a  very  favourable  example  of  his  handicraft — 
dignified,  well-balanced  and  truer  to  nature  than  might  be 
expected.  Rossi  marks  a  stage  in  the  passage  of  iconic 
sculpture  in  England  from  Carlini  to  Chantrey,  but  he  can 
hardly  be  spoken  of  as  an  individual  force. 

Rossi,  however,  seems  a  great  artist  by  the  side  of  his 
colleague  and  rival,  William  Theed,  who  was  born  in  1764, 
and  who  enjoyed  the  honours  of  membership  in  the  Royal 


ENGLISH  SCULPTURE 


Academy  from  1811  till  his  death  in  1817.  In  Theed,  the 
neglect  of  nature  and  the  living  model,  the  attempt  to  give 
plastic  forms  to  sentimental  prettinesses  and  incorporeal 
ideas,  is  seen  penetrating  the  English  school,  and  he  leads 
on  directly  to  Westmacott,  and  the  final  decadence  of 
Georgian  ideal  sculpture.  It  is  strange  that  in  the  person 
of  Theed  Flaxman  should  not  have  seen  an  awful  example 
of  the  danger  of  such  fastidiousness  of  taste  and  dread  of 
realistic  violence  as  he  himself  was  so  fond  of  preaching. 
These  refinements,  practised  by  hands  less  amply  inspired 
by  genius  and  by  the  sense  of  beauty  than  those  of  Flaxman, 
led  to  nothing  but  the  most  deplorable  ineptitude  and 
feebleness.  The  visitor  to  the  Diploma  Gallery  may 
glance  at  the  marble  alto-relievo  of  l  Ganymede,'  deposited 
there  by  the  elder  Westmacott  in  1812  ;  it  is  so  disgrace- 
fully bad  that  it  could  not  at  the  present  day  be  admitted 
as  the  work  of  the  roughest  student  in  the  schools. 

To  follow  the  beautiful  talent  of  Flaxman  to  the  point 
where  its  slow  development  culminated,  would  lead  us  too 
far  away  from  the  world  in  which  Nollekens  flourished. 
Flaxman,  moreover,  was  a  highly  imaginative  designer, 
who  occasionally  carried  into  execution  some  of  the  dreams 
of  beauty  which  were  for  ever  passing  before  his  pencil, 
but  was  not,  in  the  strict  sense,  a  very  skilful  statuary. 
He  never  learned  to  handle  the  marble  with  real  confix 
dence,  and  the  comparatively  few  works  which  he  suc- 
ceeded in  executing  were  too  often  stiff  and  mannered. 
Flaxman,  with  his  devotion  to  Greek  ideals  of  beauty,  his 
fertile  fancy,  and  his  impatience  of  the  manual  toil  of  the 
sculptor,  had  little  in  common  with  the  somewhat  stolid 
and  prosaic,  but  eminently  workmanlike,  statuaries  to  do 
justice  to  whom  an  attempt  has  been  made  in  the  preceding 
pages.  His  is  the  more  attractive  temperament,  but  they 
also  are  deserving  of  something  better  than  the  complete 
neglect  which  has  for  so  long  a.  time  overtaken  them. 

EDMUND  GOSSE. 


[21] 


JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH. 

Had  it  not  been  for  the  readiness  with  which  John  Thomas 
Smith  gossiped  about  himself  in  his  books,  there  might  be 
little  or  nothing  to  record  here  regarding  the  author  of  the 
*  Life  of  Nollekens.'  Happily,  he  was  not  restrained  by 
any  excess  of  diffidence  from  recording  incidents  with 
which  he  was  intimately  connected,  and  we  are  able  to 
string  together  enough  of  these  loose  autobiographical 
notes  to  form  something  of  a  picture  of  the  man.  As  he 
is  fond  of  reminding  us,  his  memory  was  accurate  and 
extremely  tenacious,  and  his  habit  throughout  life  was  to 
preserve  papers  and  to  note  down  occurrences.  It  is  not 
his  fault  if  too  many  of  those  eminent  men  of  whose 
peculiarities  he  preserved  a  lively  record  have  ceased  to  be 
interesting  to  us.  He  himself,  it  is  to  be  feared,  is  no 
longer  an  object  of  much  curiosity.  Such  as  he  was,  how- 
ever, in  his  humdrum  life  of  monotonous  observation,  we 
will  endeavour  to  depict  him. 

John  Thomas  Smith  was  born  on  the  evening  of  June  23, 
1766,  in  a  hackney  coach,  which  was  hurriedly  bearing 
his  mother  back,  from  a  visit  to  a  brother  in  Seven  Dials, 
to  his  father's  house,  No.  7,  Great  Portland  Street,  Maryle- 
bone.  The  child's  grandfather,  John  Smith,  had  been  a 
Shropshire  clothier  ;  his  father,  Nathaniel  Smith, '  sculptor 
and  printseller,'  had  been  a  student  in  the  St.  Martin's 
Lane  School  with  Nollekens,  and  had  proceeded  to  the 
studio  of  Roubiliac  when  the  latter  became  the  pupil  of 


22  JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH 

Scheemakers.  Nathaniel  remained  in  the  service  of 
Roubiliac  until,  on  January  15,  1762,  he  followed  the  body 
of  that  illustrious  sculptor  to  his  grave  in  St.  Martin's 
Churchyard.  The  mother  of  John  Thomas  Smith  had 
been  a  Miss  Tarr,  a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends; 
her  health  was  declining  from  his  earliest  infancy,  and 
some  of  his  infantile  memories  were  connected  with  visits 
that  she  and  he  paid,  for  the  benefit  of  her  health,  to  the 
wells  at  Greenwich  and  at  Kilburn.  She  died  in  1779.  It 
seems  that  Nathaniel  Smith  passed  into  the  employment  of 
his  old  friend  and  fellow-student,  Nollekens,  when  the 
latter  settled  in  London  in  1770,  and  J.  T.  Smith  was 
familiar  from  earliest  childhood  with  the  oddities  of  the 
remarkable  artist  whose  biographer  he  was  to  become. 

An  old  ■  star-gazer  and  tea-grouter,'  to  whom  his  mother 
took  the  child,  prophesied  that  John  Thomas  Smith  would, 
throughout  life,  'be  favoured  by  persons  of  high  rank.' 
This  prediction  was  first  realized  in  1778,  when  Mr.  Charles 
Townley  looked  over  the  boy's  shoulder  as  he  was  drawing 
in  Nollekens'  studio,  and  gave  him  half-a-guinea  to  buy 
paper  and  chalk.  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson,  also,  about  this 
time,  patted  his  head  and  praised  him  for  his  application. 
Smith  had,  indeed,  a  little  later,  an  interesting  experience 
of  Dr.  Johnson's  spirit,  for  he  'once  saw  him  follow  a 
sturdy  thief,  who  had  stolen  his  handkerchief  in  Grosvenor 
Square,  seize  him  by  the  collar  with  both  hands,  and  shake 
him  violently,  after  which  he  quickly  let  him  loose,  and 
then  with  his  open  hand  gave  him  so  powerful  a  smack  on 
the  face  that  it  sent  him  off  the  pavement  staggering. 

On  February  1,  1779,  Smith  followed  the  crowd  to  West- 
minster Abbey,  and  saw  Garrick  buried  in  Poets'  Corner. 
When  the  boy  was  about  fourteen  he  began  to  model,  and 
he  seems  to  have  attracted  the  attention  of  Wilton,  the 
sculptor,  who  gave  him  a  letter  of  introduction  to  Barto- 
lozzi,  it  having  been  decided  that  John  Thomas  should  be 
an  engraver.     Bartolozzi  was  kind,  but  refused  to  take  a 


JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH  23 

pupil,  and  in  1781  the  Bishop  of  Peterborough  (Dr.  Hinch- 
liffe)  persuaded  John  Keyse  Sherwin,  the  painter-engraver, 
to  take  him  in.  J.  T.  Smith  had  by  this  time  passed  with 
tolerable  credit  through  the  schools  of  the  Royal  Academy, 
and  he  stayed  working  under  Sherwin  until  1784.  Here  he 
was  kissed  by  the  beautiful  Perdita  Robinson,  who  drove  to 
the  studio  in  a  sky-blue  chariot,  with  a  basket  of  flowers  so 
artfully  painted  in  the  centre  of  each  panel  as  to  look  like 
a  coronet  when  the  carriage  was  in  motion.  In  1782  he 
helped  to  adjust  the  light  at  the  successive  sittings  which 
Mrs.  Siddons  gave  to  Sherwin  for  her  portrait. 

Sherwin  was  rapidly  going  down  in  the  world,  and  in 
1784  Smith,  then  eighteen  years  of  age,  was  glad  to  leave 
him.  Mr.  Richard  Wyatt,  the  amateur,  now  employed  him 
to  make  topographical  drawings  of  the  neighbourhood  of 
Windsor,  and  thus  the  favourite  labour  of  Smith's  life  was 
started.  He  was  helped  by  Thomas  Sandby,  R.A.,  and  in 
this  year  he  formed  the  acquaintance  of  Flaxman,  Blake, 
Samuel  Woodford,  and  Paul  Sandby.  On  three  occasions, 
each  of  which  he  minutely  describes,  George  III.  met  him 
and  spoke  to  him.  His  thoughts  turned  to  the  stage — for 
he  was  a  good-looking  fellow — and  in  1787  he  was  promised 
an  engagement  as  an  actor  at  the  Royalty  Theatre.  This 
came  to  nothing,  and  he  was  obliged  to  seek  for  employ- 
ment as  a  drawing-master.  For  this  purpose  he  settled  in 
lodgings  in  Gerrard  Street,  Soho.  In  this  same  year,  1787, 
he  exhibited  for  the  first  time  at  the  Royal  Academy, 
sending  a  drawing,  in  black  chalk,  of  a  famous  beech-tree 
in  Windsor  Forest,  which  was  purchased  by  the  Earl  of 
Warwick,  at  this  period  a  useful  patron  of  Smith.  In 
1788  the  artist  married,  and  settled  at  Edmonton  as  a 
portrait-painter,  under  the  patronage  of  Sir  James  Lake, 
Bart.,  of  The  Firs. 

While  at  Edmonton,  Smith  gave  increasing  attention  to 
local  topography,  issuing,  in  1791,  the  earliest  of  his 
publications,  '  The  Antiquities  of  London  and  its  Environs.' 


24  JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH 

To  this  followed,  in  1797,  his  '  Remarks  on  Rural  Scenery,' 
illustrated  from  nature  by  twenty  original  etchings  of 
picturesque  cottages.  In  May,  1798,  the  office  of  drawing- 
master  to  Christ's  Hospital  being  vacant,  J.  T.  Smith, 
warmly  supported  by  half  the  Royal  Academy,  stood  as 
a  candidate,  but  was  not  successful ;  the  testimonials  which 
he  received,  however,  were  so  flattering,  and  from  artists  of 
such  high  renown,  that  he  gave  himself  the  satisfaction  of 
printing  them.  J.  T.  Smith  left  Edmonton  in  1795,  and 
came  back  into  London,  practising  as  a  portrait-painter 
and  an  engraver,  while  not  neglecting  his  topographical 
inquiries.  In  1807  his  laborious  and  valuable  work  on 
'  The  Antiquities  of  Westminster '  was  published  for  a  large 
body  of  subscribers,  and  he  was  invited  to  treat  Lichfield 
in  the  same  way,  but  could  not  be  persuaded  to  leave  the 
London  to  which  he  was  so  deeply  devoted.  The  result  of 
his  further  studies  appeared,  in  instalments,  between  1810 
and  1815,  as  'The  Ancient  Topography  of  London,'  while 
in  the  last-mentioned  year  he  issued  his  popular  volume, 
1  The  Streets  of  London,'  a  series  of  etchings. 

On  July  23,  1816,  William  Alexander,  the  recently- 
appointed  and  first  Keeper  of  the  Prints  and  Drawings  at 
the  British  Museum,  died  of  brain-fever.  Smith  was  a 
candidate  for  the  vacant  post,  and  had  by  this  time  become 
so  distinguished  in  his  own  line  that  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury,  one  of  the  three  electors,  *  was  astonished  he 
should  think  it  worth  while  to  waste  his  strength  in  pursuit 
of  such  a  trifling  office.'  In  September,  1816,  Smith  was 
appointed,  and  held  the  keepership  until  his  death.  He 
continued  his  literary  work,  and  in  1817  published  '  Vaga- 
bondana,'  sixty  portraits  drawn  and  etched  from  life  by 
himself,  with  biographical  sketches  of  the  most  remark- 
able London  beggars  of  the  time.  As  the  reader  of  the 
present  volume  will  discover,  Nollekens,  when  he  died  in 
1823,  was  found  to  have  made  Smith  joint  executor  of  his 
will,  in   company  with  Sir  William   Beechy  and  Francis 


JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH  25 

Douce,  leaving  him  at  the  same  time,  for  his  trouble, 
£100.  The  smallness  of  this  legacy  caused  J.  T.  Smith, 
who  had  reason  to  expect  a  much  larger  benefaction,  a 
violent  disappointment,  and  his  rancour  against  Nollekens 
could  not  be  appeased.  He  revenged  himself  by  writing 
what  is  perhaps  the  most  candid  biography  ever  published 
in  the  English  language. 

Smith  did  not  long  survive  the  publication  of  his  '  Life  of 
Nollekens.'  He  died,  after  a  very  few  days'  illness,  at  his 
house  in  University  Street,  Tottenham  Court  Road,  on 
March  8,  1833,  not  having  completed  his  sixty-seventh 
year.  He  was  buried  eight  days  later  in  the  burial-ground 
of  St.  George's  Chapel,  Bayswater.  The  Gentleman's 
Magazine  paid  the  following  tribute  to  his  memory  : 

1  Mr.  Smith  was  very  generally  known,  both  from  the 
various  works  which  he  had  published,  and  from  the  public 
situation  which  he  filled  at  the  British  Museum.  He  was 
possessed  of  much  kindness  of  disposition ;  many  an 
instance  might  be  mentioned  of  his  charitable  and  friendly 
assistance  to  young  artists  who  have  sought  his  advice. 
He  had  good  judgment  to  discern  merit  where  it  existed, 
sufficient  good  feeling  to  encourage  it  in  a  deserving  object, 
and  sufficient  candour  to  deter  from  the  pursuit  where  he 
found  there  was  no  indication  of  talent.  In  short,  he  was 
a  very  warm  and  sincere  friend,  and  he  will  be  greatly 
regretted  by  many  who,  have  enjoyed  his  good-humoured 
conversation  and  ever-amusing  fund  of  anecdote,  and  par- 
ticularly by  the  frequenters  of  the  Print  Room  at  the 
Museum,  where  his  unremitting  attentions  ensured  for  him 
the  regard  and  respect  of  some  of  the  first  characters  in 
the  country.' 

At  the  time  of  his  death,  J.  T.  Smith  had  prepared  for 
the  press  a  pleasant  olio  of  gossip  and  reminiscence,  which 
was  presently  published  under  the  title  of  '  A  Book  for  a 
Rainy  Day.'  The  pictorial  works  of  Smith  have  consider- 
able merit.     His  landscapes  and  architectural  drawings,  in 


26  JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH 

the  eighteenth-century  manner,  have  great  accuracy,  and 
he  was  a  skilful  etcher  at  a  time  when  this  art  was  but 
little  practised  in  England.  The  reader  of  his  'Life  of 
Nollekens '  does  not  need  to  be  assured  that  he  was  a  most 
whimsical  and  vivacious  writer. 

E.  G. 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


[27] 


ORIGINAL    PREFACE 


Roscoe,  who  wrote  the  anonymous  Preface  to  Daulby's 
*  Catalogue  of  Rembrandt's  Etchings,'  says :  '  The  history 
of  a  man  of  genius  is,  in  general,  that  of  his  productions.' 
In  the  following  memoir  I  trust  to  do  more  than  this ;  and 
to  delineate  the  life,  not  only  of  a  '  man  of  genius/  but  of  a 
most  eccentric  character. 

To  dispense  with  the  old  custom  of  presenting  a  letter  of 
introduction,  or  sending  in  my  card  to  those  to  whom  I  am 
unknown,  would  be  irregular ;  the  reader,  therefore,  is  in- 
formed, that  I  believe  there  can  be  no  one  better  acquainted 
with  the  extraordinary  characteristics  of  the  man  of  whom 
the  following  anecdotes  are  related  than  myself,  having 
been  his  pupil  for  the  space  of  three  years,  and  intimately 
known  to  him  for  nearly  sixty.  When  I  was  anunfant  he 
frequently  danced  me  upon  his  knee. 

With  regard  to  pecuniary  and  domestic  habits,  I  am 
convinced  that  England  has  not  produced  such  a  character 
since  the  death  of  Elwes. 


28  ORIGINAL  PREFACE 

In  the  course  of  these  pages  I  have  acknowledged  my 
obligations  to  several  friends  for  their  kind  communications, 
and  here  hope  for  their  pardon  for  having  reserved  this 
place  for  my  best  thanks  to  my  friend  Mr.  Richard 
Thomson,  the  well-known  author  and  editor  of  numerous 
interesting  works,  for  his  kindness  in  many  instances. 

JOHN  THOMAS  SMITH, 

Keeper  of  the  Prints  and  Drawings  in  the 
British  Museum. 
October,  1828. 


[29] 


CHAPTER  I. 

Nollekens'  pedigree — His  father  frightened  by  the  rebels  in  1745 — 
Nollekens  placed  with  Scheemakers  the  Sculptor — His  juvenile 
passion  for  tolling  bells — He  gains  premiums  in  the  Society  of  Arts 
— Leaves  England  for  Rome — Patronized  there  by  Garrick  and 
Sterne — He  gains  the  Pope's  gold  medal — Exposed  to  assassination 
by  Barry  the  painter — Barry's  rude  and  brutal  conduct — Nollekens 
a  dealer  in  antiques — Athenian  Stuart — Nollekens  a  botcher  up  of 
ancient  fragments — A  lucky  hit — Successful  smuggling  by  Nollekens 
— His  filthy  mode  of  living  in  Rome — He  returns  to  London,  and 
is  chosen  a  member  of  the  Royal  Academy — He  falls  in  love  and 
marries — Figure  and  wedding-dress  of  his  bride — Fan-painting — 
London  antiquities. 

The  grandfather  of  Mr.  Nollekens  was  baptized  at 
Antwerp  on  March  24,  1665  ;  he  was  a  painter,  and 
made  a  long  residence  in  England,  but  subsequently 
settled  at  Roanne,  in  France.  His  son,  who  is 
recorded  by  the  various  names  of  Joseph  Franciscus, 
or  Cornelius  Franciscus,  or  Old  Nollekens,  as  he  is 
called  by  Walpole,  the  father  of  Joseph,  the  subject 
of  these  memoirs,  was  born  at  Antwerp,  in  the 
parish  of  St.  Andre,  on  June  10,  1702,  and  came  to 
England  on  May  3,  1733,  where  he  married  Mary 
Anne  Le  Sacq.  As  he  had  studied  under  Watteau, 
his  pictures,  in  point  of  subject  and  scenery,  were 
somewhat  similar  to  those  of  his  master,  though  in 
other  respects  they  were  far  short  of  that  tasteful 


30  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

artist's  feeling  ;  however,  he  supported  his  family 
with  respectability,  and  was  even  enabled  to  make 
some  provision  for  the  future. 

The  following  anecdote  of  Nollekens'  father  was 
communicated  to  me  by  James  Northcote,  Esq., 
K.A.,  who  received  it  from  our  mutual  friend,  the 
late  eminent  sculptor,  Thomas  Banks,  Esq.,  E.A. 
4  Old  Nollekens,'  observed  he,  4  was  a  miserably 
avaricious  man,  and  during  the  rebellion  in  1745 
his  house  was  marked  as  belonging  to  a  Roman 
Catholic,  and  one  in  which  the  mob  thought  them- 
selves sure  of  finding  money.  However,  they  did 
not  visit  him ;  but  the  idea  had  seized  him  so 
seriously  that  he  lingered  in  a  state  of  alarm  until 
his  death,  which  took  place  in  Dean  Street,  Soho. 
He  was  buried  at  Paddington,  in  1747,1  under  the 
names  of  Joseph  Francis  Nollekens,  leaving  a  wife, 
by  whom  he  had  five  children — viz.,  John  Joseph, 
baptized  January  29,  1735  ;  Joseph,  the  subject  of 
the  present  volume,  born  and  baptized  August  11, 
1737,  at  the  Roman  Catholic  Chapel,  in  Duke 
Street,  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields  ;  Maria  Joanna  Sophia, 
baptized  May  3,  1739  ;  Jacobus,  baptized  April  10, 
1741  ;  and  Thomas  Charles,  baptized  May  31,  1745.' 

My  late  father,  Nathaniel  Smith,  and  Joseph 
Nollekens  were  playfellows,  and  both  learned 
drawing  together  at  Shipley's  School,  then  kept  in 
the  Strand,  at  the  eastern  corner  of  Castle  Court  ; 
the  house,  now  No.  229,  is  at  present  occupied  by 
Mr.  Helps.     What  renders  the  building  the  more 

1  Old  Nollekens  died  in  the  parish  of  St.  Anne's,  Soho,  on  January  21, 
1748.— Ed. 


THE  CHILDHOOD  OF  NOLLE  KENS  31 

interesting  is  that  it  was  not  only  in  this  house  that 
the  Society  of  Arts  had  its  first  meetings,  but  it  was 
subsequently  inhabited  by  Rawle,  the  antiquary,  and 
friend  of  Captain  Grose.     On  August  7,  1755,  my 
father  was  placed  with  L.  F.  Roubiliac  j1  and  Joseph, 
in  1750,  being  then  in  his  thirteenth  year,  under 
the  care  and  instruction  of  Peter  Scheemakers,2  an 
eminent  sculptor,    at   that   time   residing   in  Vine 
Street,  Piccadilly,  on  the  site  of  the  present  Court 
of  Requests.    Joseph's  mother  subsequently  married 
a   Welshman,   named   Williams,  who    some   years 
before  her  death  conducted  her  to  his  native  place. 
Joseph    Nollekens   was    considered    by   all   the 
neighbours  of  Vine  Street  as  a  civil,  inoffensive  lad, 
but  not  particularly  bright  ;  however,  Mrs.  Schee- 
makers used  to    give  this   character  of  him,  that 
'  Joey  was  so  honest  that  she  could   always  trust 
him  to  stone  the  raisins.'     His  love  for  modelling 
was  the  greatest  pleasure  he  possessed,  though  it  is 
true  that  he  had  an  idle  propensity  for  bell-tolling, 
and  in  that  art,  for  which  many  allowed  him  to 
have  a  superior  talent,  he  would  frequently  indulge 
by   running   down   George   Court   to    St.   James's 
Church  to  know  how  funerals  went  on.     He  was 
well  known  both  to  the  sexton  and  his  man,  who 
generally  accosted  him  with  the  joyous  exclamation 
of,  ;  What,  my  little  Joey,  are  you  come  ?     Well, 
you    must    toll    to-day  !'     Whenever    his    master 

1  Where  he  remained  until  the  death  of  that  sculptor,  January  11, 
1762.— Ed. 

2  Scheemakers,  born  about  1700,  was  a  native  of  Antwerp.  He  left 
England  in  1 769,  and  died  soon  after.  He  executed  many  monuments 
in  London,  and  was  a  formidable  rival  to  Roubiliac. — Ed. 


32  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

missed  him,  and  the  dead-bell  was  tolling,  he  knew 
perfectly  well  what  Joey  was  at. 

He  had  so  little  pride  that  he  himself  has  stated 
he  was  often  met  slowly  and  steadily  creeping  along 
to  save  the  head  of  a  pot  of  porter,  which  the  maids 
had  sent  him  for  on  a  washing  clay  ;  but  notwith- 
standing all  his  childish  inclinations,  he  was,  as 
he  grew  up,  not  unmindful  of  his  art,  rose  early, 
practised  carefully,  and  being  a  true  son  of  his 
father,  passionately  fond  of  money,  started  for  the 
prizes  offered  by  the  Society  of  Arts  ;  and  it  gives 
me  infinite  pleasure  to  state  that  Joseph  Nollekens 
and  Nathaniel  Smith,  mv  father,  carried  off  some 
of  the  first  and  best  of  its  premiums,  as  will  appear 
by  the  following  extracts  from  the  Registrar's 
books  : 

1  In  1759,  to  Joseph  Nollekens  was  adjudged  the  sum  of  lbl.  15s.  for 
a  model  in  clay  of  figures.  In  1760,  for  a  model  in  clay,  a  bas-relief, 
31Z.  10s.  ;  and  in  the  same  year,  for  a  model  in  clay  of  a  daucing  Faun, 
10Z.  10s.' 

As  Mr.  Nollekens'  mother  had  married  a  Welsh- 
man, who  was  partial  to  his  native  air,  he  easily 
persuaded  her  to  accompany  him  into  Wales  ;  and 
the  brothers  and  sisters  of  Nollekens  being  all 
abroad,  he  had  no  motive  to  induce  him  to  give  up 
an  inclination  he  had  long  entertained  of  travelling 
to  see  the  works  of  Michael  Angelo,  and  of  other 
great  men.  He,  therefore,  after  having  served  his 
friendly  master  full  ten  years,  without  the  exchange 
of  one  unpleasant  word,  left  England  for  Rome  in 
the  year  1760,  with  all  the  little  property  he  had 
acquired. 


NOLLEKENS  IN  ROME  33 

Taking  Paris  in  his  way,  lie  called  upon  his 
uncle,  who,  from  his  questions  and  cool  manner  of 
half  opening  the  street-door,  appeared  to  doubt  the 
veracity  of  his  visitor.  However,  upon  his  seeing 
him  in  possession  of  a  gold  watch,  he  was  tempted 
to  ask  him  in,  and  slightly  pressed  him  to  stay 
dinner,  but  this  invitation  Nollekens,  who  had  felt  a 
chill,  proudly  declined. 

On  his  arrival  at  Rome,  he  found  his  purse 
reduced  to  twenty-one  guineas,  and,  from  a  dread 
of  want  of  money,  he  soon  executed  a  basso-relievo 
in  stone,  which  he  consigned  to  England,  and  for 
which,  in  1760,  he  had  the  honour  of  receiving  a 
prize  of  £10  10s.  ;  but  his  spirits  were  exhilarated 
to  a  much  higher  degree  in  1762,  bv  the  vote  of  a 
prize  of  £52  10s.  for  a  basso-relievo  in  marble, 
which  is  thus  clumsily  noticed  in  the  Public 
Advertiser  of  Tuesday,  May  25,  1762  : 

{ At  a  meeting  of  the  Society  of  Polite  Arts,  on  Friday  last,  for 
a  marble  basso-relievo,  the  subject  Timocles  conducted  before 
Alexander,  the  premium  of  fifty  guineas  was  given  to  Mr.  Joseph 
Nollekens,  pupil  of  Mr.  Scheemakers.' 

Whilst  Mr.  Nollekens  was  at  Rome,  he  was 
recognised  by  Mr.  Garrick  with  the  familiar  ex- 
clamation  of,  '  What  !  let  me  look  at  you  !  Are 
you  the  little  fellow  to  whom  we  gave  the  prizes  at 
the  Society  of  Arts  ?'  '  Yes,  sir,'  being  the  answer, 
Mr.  Garrick  invited  him  to  breakfast  the  next 
morning,  and  kindly  sat  to  him  for  his  bust,  for 
which  he  paid  him  £12  12s.  ;  and  I  have  not  only 
often  heard  Mr.  Nollekens  affirm  that  the  payment 

3  " 


34  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

was  made  in  '  gold,'  but  that  this  was  the  first  busto 
he  ever  modelled. 

Sterne  also  sat  to  him  when  at  Rome,1  and  that 
bust  brought  him  into  great  notice.  With  this 
performance  Nollekens  continued  to  be  pleased  even 
to  his  second  childhood,  and  often  mentioned  a 
picture  which  Dance  had  made  of  him  leaning  upon 
Sterne's  head.  During  his  residence  in  Italv  he 
gained  the  Pope's  gold  medal  for  a  basso-relievo, 
which  will  be  afterwards  noticed. 

Barry,2  the  historical  painter,  who  was  extremely 
intimate  with  Nollekens  at  Rome,  took  the  liberty 
one  night,  when  they  were  about  to  leave  the 
English  coffee-house,  to  exchange  hats  with  him — 
Barry's  was  edged  with  lace,  and  Nollekens'  was  a 
very  shabby  plain  one.  Upon  his  returning  the  hat 
the  next  morning,  he  was  requested  by  Nollekens  to 
let  him  know  whv  he  left  him  his  s;old-laced  hat. 
4  Why,  to  tell  you  the  truth,  my  dear  Joey,' 
answered  Barry,  '  I  fully  expected  assassination  last 
night,  and  I  was  to  have  been  known  by  my  laced 
hat.'  This  villainous  transaction,  which  might 
have  proved  fatal  to  Nollekens,  I  have  often  heard 
him  relate  ;  and  he  generally  added,  c  It's  what  the 
Old  Bailey  people  would  call  a  true  bill  against 
-Jem.'  Although  Barry  was  of  an  irritable  and 
vindictive  spirit,  yet,  after  ridiculing  Nollekens 
upon  almost  every  subject,  he  would  not  scruple  to 
accept  little  acts  of  kindness  at  his  hand,  and  then 
with  the  greatest  brutality  insult  him. 

1  In  the  winter  of  1765.— Ed. 

2  James  Barry  (1741-1806),  elected  A.R.A.  in  1772,  R.A.  in  1773, 
and  expelled  from  the  Royal  Academy  in  1799. — Ed. 


fAMES  BARRY  35 


I  remember  an  instance  of  this  kind  of  conduct, 
which  took  place  soon  after  Barry  had  completed 
the  etchings  from  his  pictures  in  the  Adelphi. 
Nollekens,  who  was  quite  delighted  in  procuring 
him  subscribers,  once  called  out  to  him  as  he 
entered  the  studio,  '  Well,  Jem,  I  have  been  very 
successful  for  you  this  week  :  do  you  know,  I  have 
procured  you  three  more  subscribers  to  your  prints 
from  the  'Delphi  pictures  !'  Barry,  instead  of  even 
returning  a  smile  for  his  kindness,  or  thanking  him 
by  a  nod,  flew  into  a  most  violent  passion,  and, 
uttering  the  coarsest  imprecations,  of  which  he 
possessed  a  boundless  variety,  bade  him  to  attend 
in  future  to  his  own  business,  and  not  to  solicit 
subscriptions  to  his  works,  adding,  after  the  utter- 
ance of  a  most  wretched  oath,  that  if  the  nobility 
wanted  his  works,  they  knew  where  he  was  to  be 
found,  and  they  might  come  to  him — he  wanted  no 
little  jackanapes  to  go  between  him  and  those  who 
ought  to  apply  at  once  to  the  principal.  And  all 
this  bombast  was  because  Nollekens  had  declared 
his  success  in  the  presence  of  his  workmen  in  the 
studio.  Had  he  received  the  information  in  his 
parlour  all  would  have  been  well,  and  he  would 
have  pocketed  the  money,  as  he  had  done  frequently 
before  ;  for  to  my  own  knowledge  Mr.  Nollekens 
procured  him  several  names  of  personages  of  the 
highest  rank. 

During  Mr.  Nollekens'  residence  at  Rome  he 
purchased,  among  other  articles,  by  which  he  made 
considerable  sums  of  money,  numerous  pieces  of 
ancient  Roman  terra-cottas,  some  of  exquisite  taste, 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


from  the  labourers  who  were  employed  in  diggings 
gravel  at  Porta  Latina  :  they  were  mostly  dis- 
covered at  the  bottom  of  a  dry  well,  and  must 
evidently  have  been  placed  there  for  security. 
Xollekens,  who  bought  them  for  a  mere  trifle,  sold 
them,  upon  his  arrival  in  England,  to  Mr.  Townley,1 
and,  together  with  that  gentleman's  marbles,  they 
have  since  been  purchased  by  Government  for  a 
considerable  sum,  and  are  now  let  into  the  walls 
of  the  first  room  of  the  Gallery  of  Antiquities 
in  the  British  Museum.  In  this  collection  there 
are  many  duplicates,  which  are  so  precisely  like 
each  other  that,  in  all  probability,  they  were  pressed 
from  the  same  mould.  Independently  of  the 
graceful  figures  which  are  introduced  in  several  of 
these  compositions,  the  foliated  ornaments  are  ex- 
tremelv  lis;ht  and  beautiful. 

Mr.  Xollekens,  from  the  year  1761  to  the  time  he 
left  Rome,  consigned  several  of  his  productions  to 
his  friend,  Athenian  Stuart,2  who  had  undertaken,  in 
consequence  of  an  early  intimacy,  to  see  them 
placed  in  the  best  of  the  exhibitions  in  London, 
which  he  certainly  did  until  the  establishment  of 
the  Royal  Academy  ;  and  then,  being  inimical  to 
the  interests  of  that  respectable  body,  he  departed 
from  his  confidential  trust,  by  suffering  the  works 
of   Xollekens   to   be   exhibited  with   those  of   the 

1  Charles  Townley,  born  in  1737,  died  January  3,  1805.  He  was 
J.  T.  Smith's  earliest  admirer  and  patron. — Ed. 

2  James  Stuart,  the  architect,  was  born  in  1713.  He  was  one  of 
the  first  men  to  make  a  minute  study  on  the  spot,  between  1751  and 
1755,  of  ancient  Greek  architecture.  In  1762  he  published  a  valuable 
work  on  the  antiquities  of  Athens.     He  died  in  1788. — Ed. 


PATRONS  37 


rejected   artists,  who  were   certainly   of   the    most 
inferior  class. 

Mr.  Nollekens,  upon  his  return  to  England,  dis- 
covered the  treachery,  and  was  so  highly  exas- 
perated with  his  pretended  friend's  conduct  that  he 
never  entirely  forgave  him,  though  he  certainly 
now  and  then  visited  him. 

The  patrons  of  Nollekens,  being  characters  pro- 
fessing taste  and  possessing  wealth,  employed  him 
as  a  very  shrewd  collector  of  antique  fragments, 
some  of  which  he  bought  on  his  own  account ;  and 
after  he  had  dexterously  restored  them  with  heads 
and  limbs,  he  stained  them  with  tobacco -water, 
and  sold  them,  sometimes  by  way  of  favour,  for 
enormous  sums. 

My  old  friend,  Mr.  George  Arnald,  A.K.A.,1 
favoured  me  with  the  following  anecdote,  which  he 
received  immediately  from  Mr.  Nollekens,  con- 
cerning some  of  these  fragments  :  Jenkins,  a 
notorious  dealer  in  antiques  and  old  pictures, 
who  resided  at  Rome  for  that  purpose,  had  been 
commissioned  by  Mr.  Locke,2  of  Norbury  Park,  to 
send  him  any  piece  of  sculpture  which  he  thought 
might  suit  him,  at  a  price  not  exceeding  one 
hundred  guineas  ;  but  Mr.  Locke,  immediately 
upon  the  receipt  of  a  head  of  Minerva,  which  he 
did  not  like,  sent  it  back  again,  paying  the  carriage 
and  all  other  expenses. 

1  A  landscape-painter,  born  in  1763,  and  elected  A.R.A.  in  1810. 
He  was  never  promoted  to  be  an  R.A.,  but  survived  until  1841,  He 
was  the  brother  of  Sebastian  Wyndham  Arnald,  the  sculptor. — Ed. 

2  William  Locke,  the  amateur,  born  in  17G7. — Ed. 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Nollekens,  who  was  then  also  a  resident  in  Rome, 
having  purchased  a  trunk  of  a  Minerva  for  £50, 
found,  upon  the  return  of  this  head,  that  its  pro- 
portion and  character  accorded  with  his  torso.  This 
discovery  induced  him  to  accept  an  offer  made  by 
Jenkins  of  the  head  itself,  and  two  hundred  and 
twenty  guineas  to  share  the  profits.  After  Nollekens 
had  made  it  up  into  a  figure,  or,  what  is  called  by  the 
vendors  of  botched  antiques,  '  restored  it,'  which  he 
did  at  the  expense  of  about  twenty  guineas  more  for 
stone  and  labour,  it  proved  a  most  fortunate  hit,  for 
they  sold  it  for  the  enormous  sum  of  one  thousand 
guineas!  and  it  is  now  at  Newby,  in  Yorkshire. 
The  late  celebrated  Charles  Townlev  and  the  late 
Henry  Blundell,  Esqs.,  were  two  of  his  principal 
customers  for  antiques.  Mr.  Nollekens  was  like- 
wise an  indefatigable  inquirer  after  terra-cottas, 
executed  by  the  most  celebrated  sculptors,  Michael 
Angelo,  John  di  Bologna,  Fiamingo,  etc.  The  best 
of  these  he  reserved  for  himself  until  the  day  of  his 
death. 

The  late  Earl  of  Bes[s] borough  and  the  late  Lord 
Selsey  were  much  attached  to  Mr.  Nollekens  at  this 
time,  but  his  greatest  friend  was  the  Lord  Yar- 
borough.1  For  that  nobleman  he  executed  many 
very  considerable  works  in  marble,  for  which  he 
received  most  liberal  and  immediate  payment. 
Xollekens,  who  wished  upon  all  occasions  to  save 
every  shilling  he  possibly  could,  was  successful  in 

1  This  was  Charles  Anderson-Pelham,  raised  to  the  peerage  as 
Baron  Yarborough  in  1794.  He  died  in  1823.  He  was  the  father  of 
the  first  Earl.— Ed. 


NOLLEKENS  IN  ROME  39 


another  manoeuvre.  He  actually  succeeded  as  a 
smuggler  of  silk  stockings,  gloves  and  lace  ;  his 
contrivance  was  truly  ingenious,  and  perhaps  it 
was  the  first  time  that  the  Custom  House  officers 
had  ever  been  so  taken  in.  His  method  was  this  : 
All  his  plaster  busts  being  hollow,  he  stuffed  them 
full  of  the  above  articles,  and  then  spread  an  out- 
side coating  of  plaster  at  the  back  across  the 
shoulders  of  each,  so  that  the  busts  appeared  like 
solid  casts.  I  recollect  his  pointing  to  the  cast  of 
Sterne,  and  observing  to  the  late  Lord  Mansfield  : 
'  There,  do  you  know,  that  busto,  my  lord,  held 
my  lace  ruffles  that  I  went  to  Court  in  when  I  came 
from  Koine.' 

His  mode  of  living  when  at  Rome  was  most 
filthy  :  he  had  an  old  woman,  who,  as  he  stated, 
c  did  for  him,'  and  she  was  so  good  a  cook  that  she 
would  often  give  him  a  dish  for  dinner  which  cost 
him  no  more  than  threepence.  '  Nearly  opposite 
to  my  lodgings,'  he  said,  'there  lived  a  pork- 
butcher,  who  put  out  at  his  door  at  the  end  of  the 
week  a  plateful  of  what  he  called  cuttings,  bits  of 
skin,  bits  of  gristle,  and  bits  of  fat,  which  he  sold 
for  twopence,  and  my  old  lady  dished  them  up  with 
a  little  pepper  and  a  little  salt  ;  and,  with  a  slice  of 
bread  and  sometimes  a  bit  of  vegetable,  I  made  a 
very  nice  dinner.'  Whenever  good  dinners  were 
mentioned  he  was  sure  to  say  :  '  Ay,  I  never  tasted 
a  better  dish  than  my  Roman  cuttings.' 

By  this  time  the  name  of  Nollekens  was  pretty 
well  known  on  the  Stock  Exchange  of  London  as  a 
holder  to  a  considerable  amount,  and  he  arrived  in 


40  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

England  time  enough  to  take  a  lease  of  the  pre- 
mises, No.  9,  Mortimer  Street,  Cavendish  Square, 
then  the  property  of  Francis  Milner  Newton,1  Esq., 
K.A.,  a  very  indifferent  portrait-painter,  who  had 
been  a  pupil  of  Marcus  Teuscher,  an  artist  of  no 
great  talent,  but  a  very  good  man.  Mr.  Newton 
was  Muster-master  of  England,  and  srenerallv  wore 
the  Windsor  uniform,  and  had  also  been  secretary 
to  the  Royal  Academy  ever  since  its  establish- 
ment. This  office  he  resigned  in  1788,  and  died  at 
his  house  at  Barton,  near  Taunton,  in  August, 
1794. 

Mr.  Nollekens  soon  turned  the  Muster- master's 
painting-room  into  a  studio  for  sculpture,  and  was 
honoured  with  orders  from  some  of  the  first  person- 
ages in  this  countrv,  who  sat  to  him  at  all  hours  for 
their  busts  ;  and  so  fashionable  was  he  in  that  depart- 
ment of  his  art  that  I  have  known  him  to  have  four 
sitters  in  a  day.  Our  sculptor  now  exhibited  in  Pall 
Mall  with  the  Royal  Academy,  to  which  he  presented 
a  fine  cast  of  the  torso,  having  brought  it  from 
Rome  for  that  purpose.  In  177 12  the  Academicians 
chose  him  an  Associate,  and  in  the  following  vear 
elected  him  R.A.  With  this  election  our  late 
gracious   King,  when   he    signed  his  diploma,   de- 

1  Born  in  1720  ;  foundation  member  and  first  secretary  of  the 
Royal  Academy. — Ed. 

2  Mr.  Nollekens  was  invited  to  the  funeral  of  Jonathan  Richard- 
son, jun.,  son  of  the  author  of  the  work  on  'Painting,'  and  the 
collector  of  many  fine  drawings.  He  died  at  his  house  in  Queen 
Square,  and  was  buried  in  the  ground  belonging  to  the  parish,  behind 
the  Foundling  Hospital,  where  it  is  recorded  that  he  departed  this  life 
on  June  G,  1771,  aged  seventy-six. — Smith. 


MARY  WELCH  41 


clared  himself  pleased  in  the  most  flattering  terms 
of  approbation,  and  immediately  honoured  him  still 
more  by  sitting  for  his  bnst. 

Mr.  Nollekens  now,  for  the  first  time,  fell  des- 
perately in  love.  The  lady  was  Mary,  the  second 
daughter  of  Sanders  Welch,  Esq.,  the  successor  in 
the  magistracy  of  his  friend,  Henry  Fielding,  on 
his  departure  for  Lisbon.  This  lady,  the  pink  of 
precision,  bestowed  her  hand  upon  him,  and  they 
were  married  at  the  altar  of  Marylebone  Church  in 
the  presence  of  her  father  and  sister  Anne.  This 
lady,  wTho  will  be  mentioned  hereafter,  was  mistress 
of  seven  lan^uao-es.  She  was  a  Protestant  when 
she  attended  her  sister's  marriage,  but  became 
a  Roman  Catholic  shortly  after  her  arrival  at 
Koine. 

In  what  style  of  language  their  courtship  was 
carried  on,  how  Miss  Mary  became  better  acquainted 
with  Master  Joseph,  or  how  far  he  was  speech- 
gifted  in  Love's  soft  lispings,  I  am  totally  ignorant ; 
but  it  has  been  seen  that  Joseph  was  a  c  thriving 
wooer.' 

Marv's  figure  was  rather  too  tall,  but  vet  orace- 
ful ;  her  eyes  were  good,  and  she  knew  how  to 
play  with  them  ;  her  blooming  complexion  stood 
in  no  need  of  milk  of  roses  ;  her  nose,  I  must  own, 
and  it  was  the  opinion  of  Nollekens,  too,  was  rather 
of  the  shortest  ;  her  teeth  were  small,  bespeaking 
a  selfish  disposition  ;  indeed,  the  whole  of  her 
features  were  what  her  husband  would  sometimes 
call  c  scorny,'  particularly  in  their  latter  days 
during  their  little  fracas,  for,  be  it  known,  she  had 


42  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

no  small  sprinkling  of  pride,  in  consequence  of  a 
compliment  paid  her  by  Dr.  Johnson.  Her  light 
hair  shone  in  natural  and  beautiful  ringlets  down 
her  back  to  the  lower  part  of  her  tightly-laced 
waist — such  a  shaped  waist  as  her  fathers  friend, 
Fielding,  has  given  Sophia  Western  in  his  c  Tom 
Jones.' 

This  ladv's  interesting  figure  on  her  wedding- 
day  was  attired  in  a  sacque  aiid  petticoat  of  the  most 
expensive  brocaded  white  silk,  resembling  network, 
enriched  with  small  flowers,  which  displayed  in  the 
variation  of  the  folds  a  most  delicate  shade  of 
pink,  the  uncommon  beauty  of  which  was  greatly 
admired.  The  deep  and  pointed  stomacher  was 
exquisitely  gimped  and  pinked,  and  at  the  lower 
part  was  a  large  pin  consisting  of  several  diamonds, 
confining  an  elegant  point-lace  apron,  certainly  at 
that  period  rather  unfashionable,  but  on  this  happy 
event  affectionately  worn  by  the  lady  in  memory 
of  her  dear  mother,  who  had  presented  it  to  her — 
indeed,  Mrs.  Nollekens  was  frequently  heard  to 
declare  that  she  was  above  '  the  fleeting  whimsies 
of  depraved  elegance.'  The  sleeves  of  this  dress 
closelv  fitted  the  arm  to  a  little  below  the  elbow, 
from  which  hung  three  point-lace  ruffles  of  great 
depth  ;  a  handkerchief  of  the  same  costly  texture 
partly  concealed  the  beauty  of  her  bosom,  wherein, 
confined  by  a  large  bow,  was  a  bouquet  of  rose- 
buds, the  delicate  tints  of  which  were  imperceptibly 
blended  with  the  transparency  of  her  complexion, 
and  not  a  little  increased  the  beauty  of  a  triple  row 
of   pearls,  tied   behind  with  a  narrow  white  satin 


MRS.  N0LLEKEN8  DRESS  43 

ribbon.  Her  beautiful  auburn  hair,  which  she 
never  disguised  by  the  use  of  powder,  according  to 
the  fashion  of  the  day,  was  upon  this  occasion 
arranged  over  a  cushion  made  to  fit  the  head  to  a 
considerable  height,  with  large  round  curls  on 
either  side,  the  whole  being  surmounted  by  a  small 
cap  of  point-lace,  with  plaited  flaps,  to  correspond 
with  the  apron  and  ruffles.1  Her  shoes  were  com- 
posed of  the  same  material  as  her  dress,  orna- 
mented with  silver  spangles  and  square  Bristol 
buckles,  with  heels  three  inches  and  a  half  in 
height,  as  if  she  meant  to  exult  in  out-topping  her 
little  husband,  whose  head,  even  when  he  had  his 
hat  on,  reached  no  higher  than  her  shoulder. 

Mrs.  Nollekens'  father  was  at  the  expense  of 
her  marriage  wardrobe,  which  cost  about  £200  : 
among  her  dresses  was  one  of  a  fashionable 
Carmelite,  a  rich  purple  brown,  and  another  con- 
sisted of  a  lavender  silk,  brocaded  with  white,  and 
enriched  with  bouquets  of  carnations,  auriculas, 
and  jessamines  the  size  of  nature.  The  bride- 
groom's dress  was  a  suit  of  '  Pourpre  du  Pape,'  silk 
stockings  with  broad  blue  and  white  stripes,  and  lace 
ruffles  and  frill,  the  whole  of  which  articles  he  had 

1  In  looking  at  the  dresses  of  former  days,  it  is  curious  to  see  in 
what  a  short  time  fashions  rise  and  fall  from  one  extreme  to  another. 
In  1760,  when  the  lace  apron  was  declining  in  favour,  a  lady  wore  her 
hair  short  and  thin,  and  quite  close  to  her  head,  with  a  small  flower  or 
ornament  on  the  top  of  her  forehead,  nor  was  it  until  1769  that  the 
head-dress  was  much  increased  ;  but  in  1772  it  became  preposterously 
high,  under  the  most  fashionable  leader  of  the  day,  D.  Ritchie,  hair- 
dresser and  dentist,  then  living  in  Rupert  Street,  two  doors  from 
Coventry  Street.  In  1777  sacques  disappeared,  and  the  large  bell- 
hoops  came  into  fashion. — Smith. 


44  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


brought  from  Kome.  His  hair  was  dressed  in  curls 
on  either  side,  with  an  immense  toupee,  and  finished 
with  a  small  bag  tied  as  closely  as  possible  to  his 
neck.  Mrs.  Holt,  who  was  Mrs.  Nollekens' 
domestic  companion  for  many  years,  and  who 
attended  Mr.  Nollekens  in  his  last  illness,  has 
enabled  me  to  be  thus  minute  in  my  description  of 
the  dresses  worn  by  the  bride  and  bridegroom. 

Mrs.  Nollekens  had  a  tolerable  stock  of  reading 
and  a  pretty  good  memory,  but  no  sound  knowledge 
of  any  of  the  superior  accomplishments  of  her  sex, 
as  her  youthful  studies  went  very  little  beyond 
delicate  needlework  and  translating  French.  She 
never  knew  the  pleasures  of  a  mother,  for,  in  her 
opinion,  '  children  were  serious  responsibilities  ' ; 
and  her  matrimonial  amusements  were  not  like 
those  of  the  good  Vicar  of  Wakefield's  wife,  for  I 
never  heard  of  her  making  gooseberry  wine  :  a 
game  at  cribbage,  or  a  rubber  at  whist,  was  her 
delight ;  but  then  she  made  it  a  rule  never  to  risk 
more  than  sixpence  the  rub,  for  which  resolution 
most  well-thinking  persons  will  give  her  credit ; 
but  then,  when  primly  seated,  she  would  insist 
upon  the  nice  precision  of  the  game,  as  her  mother 
played  it,  c  according  to  Hoyle,  Mr.  Edward  Hojde.'1 
In  this  way  of  passing  time,  for  she  knew  nothing 
of  drawing  or  j)ainting,  she  would  now  and  then, 
when  at  home,  coax  her  Nolly  to  join  her  ;  but 
rarely  suffered  him  to  touch  a  card  when  they  were 

1  Mrs.  Nollekens  recollected  that  Hoyle,  the  author  of  a  treatise  on 
the  game  of  whist,  was  buried  at  Marylebone,  August  23,  1769,  and 
that  he  was  ninety  years  old  when  he  died. — Smith. 


ATHENIAN  STUART  45 

visiting,  on   account  of  his  playing  so  ill  that  he 
was  sure  to  lose. 

It  gives  me  the  highest  gratification  to  observe 
that  painting  is  now  considered  so  essential  a  branch 
of  polite  education  that  many  persons,  who  are  dis- 
tinguished both  for  elegance  and  fashion,  are  never 
more  delighted  than  when  they  are  engaged  in  its 
interesting  pursuits.  When  Mrs.  Nollekens  was  a 
girl,  Goupy,1  her  father's  intimate  friend,  was  con- 
sidered the  most  eminent  of  the  fan-painters  ;  and 
so  fashionable  was  fan-painting  at  that  time,  that 
the  family  of  Athenian  Stuart  placed  him  as  a  pupil 
to  that  artist,  conceiving  that  by  so  doing  they  had 
made  his  fortune.  Stuart's  genius,  however,  in  a 
short  time  soared  to  the  pinnacle  of  fame  by  flying 
to  Athens  for  those  inestimable  treasures  which  will 
immortalize  his  name,  notwithstanding  Hogarth's 
satire  upon  the  publication  of  his  first  volume  ; 
for,  indeed,  we  have  not  now  a  student  who  speaks 
of  Stuart  without  the  honourable  surname  of 
c  Athenian.' 

Some  years  before  I  had  any  connection  with 
Mr.  Nollekens  as  an  instructor,  my  intercourse  with 
him  was  frequent,  notwithstanding  the  disparity  of 
our  ages  ;  and  he  has  often  taken  me  to  walk  with 
him  in  various  parts  of  London,  when  he  seemed  to 
feel  a  pleasure  in  pointing  out  curious  vestiges  and 
alterations  to  my  notice,  as  well  as  in  showing  me 
some  remarkable  sights  of  the  time.  Perhaps  these 
communications  gave  the  first  impetus  to  that  love 

1  Joseph  Goupy,  a  Frenchman,  the  drawing-master  of  Frederick, 
Prince  of  Wales.     He  died  in  1763.— Ed. 


46  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

for  Metropolitan  antiquities  which  I  entertained  so 
early,  and  which  even  now  continues  unabated. 
His  recollections  of  many  of  the  places  we  visited 
often  furnished  me  with  curious  and  interesting 
pictures  of  London  as  it  appeared  in  his  own  youth  ; 
and  several  of  the  most  singular  of  them  I  have 
ventured  to  introduce  into  these  anecdotes. 


[47] 


CHAPTER   II. 

Execution  of  Sixteen-string  Jack — Model  of  the  King's  state  coach — 
Sir  Nathaniel  Dance  Holland — Tradesmen's  signs  sometimes  painted 
by  eminent  artists — Costly  one  of  Shakespeare  exposed  for  sale — 
Ignatius  Sancho — Mortimer  the  painter  and  Mr.  Payne  Knight — 
Duke  of  Monmouth's  house  in  Soho — Marylebone  basin  and  gardens 
and  Cockney  Ladle — Fruit-gardens  in  Gower  Street — Commence- 
ment of  my  own  acquaintance  with  Nollekens — His  servant  Bronze 
— Hudson's  sale  of  prints,  and  anecdote  of  Sir  J.  Reynolds — Nol- 
lekens' recollections  of  London— Athenian  Stuart — Colonel  King — 
Residents  of  rank  in  Soho— Streets  visible  at  one  point — Nollekens' 
first  print  and  subsequent  collection — Recollections  of  his  mother 
— Farthing  posts  and  early  newspapers — Characteristics  of  Mrs. 
Nollekens — Dr.  Johnson's  bust  by  Nollekens — His  odd  conduct  to 
his  sisters — His  parsimonious  habits — His  monument  for  Dr. 
Goldsmith. 

I  remember  well,  when  I  was  in  my  eighth  year, 
Mr.  Nollekens  calling  at  my  father's  house  in  Great 
Portland  Street,  and  taking  me  to  Oxford  Eoad  to 
see  the  notorious  Jack  Rann,  commonly  called 
4  Sixteen-string  Jack,'  go  to  Tyburn  to  be  hanged 
for  robbing  Dr.  William  Bell,  in  Gunnersbury  Lane, 
of  his  watch  and  eighteen-pence  in  money  ;  for 
which  he  received  sentence  of  death  on  Tuesday, 
October  26,  1774.  The  criminal  was  dressed  in  a 
pea-green  coat,  with  an  immense  nosegay  in  the 
buttonholes,  which  had  been  presented  to  him  at 


48  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 


St.  Sepulchre's  steps  ;  and  his  nankeen  small-clothes, 
we  were  told,  were  tied  at  each  knee  with  sixteen 
strings.  After  he  had  passed,  and  Mr.  Nollekens 
was  leading  me  home  by  the  hand,  I  recollect  his 
stooping  down  to  me  and  observing,  in  a  low  tone 
of  voice  :  '  Tom,  now,  my  little  man,  if  my  father- 
in-law,  Mr.  Justice  Welch,  had  been  High  Constable, 
we  could  have  walked  by  the  side  of  the  cart  all 
the  way  to  Tyburn.' 

I  also  remember,  one  Sunday  morning,  going 
with  my  father  and  Mr.  Nollekens  to  see  the  studio 
and  workshop  of  the  late  Joseph  Wilton,1  Esq.,  K.  A., 
father  of  the  present  Lady  Chambers,  and  friend  of 
Barretti.  Wilton,  on  his  return  from  his  travels, 
brought  Capizzoldi  and  Cipriani2  to  this  country. 
Mr.  Wilton's  studio  stood  on  the  south  side  of 
Queen  Anne  Street  East,  now  called  Foley  Place, 
upon  the  site  of  five  houses,  Nos.  22,  23,3  24,  25, 
and  26  ;  in  the  house  No.  27,  at  the  corner  of  Fort- 
land  Street,  Mr.  Wilton  resided  for  many  years. 
We  viewed  his  works,  and  the  model  of  King 
George  III.'s  state  coach,  a  most  beautiful  little 
toy,  exquisitely  adorned  with  ornaments  modelled 
in  wax  by  Capizzoldi  and  Yoyers,  the  panels  being 
painted  in  water-colours  by  Cipriani.  The  designs 
consisted  of    figures  and  historical    emblems,  and 

1  Joseph  Wilton  (1722-1803),  the  sculptor.  See  prefatory  essay. 
—Ed, 

2  Giovanni  Battista  Cipriani,  born  in  Florence  in  1727,  arrived  in 
England  in  1756,  became  a  foundation  member  of  the  Royal  Academy, 
and  died  in  1785.— Ed. 

3  No.  23  was  the  residence  of  Edward  Malone,  Esq.,  the  well-known 
editor  of  Shakespeare. — Smith. 


SIGN-PAINTERS  49 


Cipriani  also  painted  the  same  subjects  upon  the 
coach  itself  ;  but  he  was  not  the  first  eminent  artist 
who  had  tlms  adorned  a  carriage,  or  even  painted  a 
sign.  The  old  royal  state  coach  was  purchased  by 
the  City  of  London,  the  panels  of  which  were 
repainted  by  Dance,1  afterwards  Sir  Nathaniel 
Dance  Holland,  Bart.,  who  was  the  painter  of  that 
most  admirable  whole-length  picture  of  Garrick  in 
'  Richard  III.,'  now  in  the  front  drawing-room  of 
Sir  Watkin  Williams  Wynn,  Bart.,  in  his  town 
mansion,  St.  James's  Square. 

Mr.  Smirke,2  the  celebrated  artist,  also  served 
his  time  under  a  herald-painter,  of  the  name  of 
Bromley,  who  died  lately  in  Queen  Street,  Lincoln's 
Inn  Fields. 

George  Morland3  painted  a  sign  of  a  white  lion 
for  a  public -house  at  Paddington. 

Monamy,4  the  famous  marine-painter,  decorated 
a  carriage  for  the  gallant  and  unfortunate  Admiral 
Byng,  with  ships  and  naval  trophies  ;  and  he  also 
painted  a  portrait  of  Admiral  Vernon's  ship,  for  a 
famous  public-house  of  the  day,  well  known  by  the 
sign  of  the  'Porto  Bello,'  remaining  until  recently 
within  a  few  doors  north  of  the  church  in  St. 
Martin's  Lane.  After  the  battle  of  Culloden,  most 
of  the  old  signs  of  military  and  naval  victors  gave 
way  to  the   head  of  Duke  William  ;  and  Horace 

1  Nathaniel  Dance  (1734-1811),  a  foundation  member  of  the  Royal 
Academy. — En. 

2  Robert  Smirke  (1752-1845),  elected  A.R.A.  in  1791,  and  R.A.  in 
1793.     He  was  a  great  illustrator  of  books. — Ed. 

3  George  Morland  (1763-1804),  the  famous  animal-painter. — Ed. 

4  Pierre  Monamy  (1G70-1749),  an  imitator  of  Van  de  Velde.— Ed. 

4 


5o  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Walpole  has  noticed  this  change  in  his  thirteenth 
letter  to  Mr.  Conway,  dated  April  16,  1747. 

1 1  was,'  says  that  elegant  author,  '  yesterday  out 
of  town,  and  the  very  signs,  as  I  passed  through  the 
villages,  made  me  make  very  quaint  reflections  on 
the  mortality  of  fame  and  popularity.  I  observed 
how  the  Duke's  head  had  succeeded  almost  uni- 
versally to  Admiral  Vernon's,  as  his  had  left  but 
few  traces  of  the  Duke  of  Ormond's.  I  pondered 
these  things  in  my  heart,  and  said  unto  myself, 
Surely  all  glory  is  but  as  a  sign  !' 

Clarkson,  the  portrait-painter,  was  originally  a 
coach-panel  and  sign  painter  ;  and  he  executed  that 
most  elaborate  one  of  Shakespeare  1  which  formerly 
hung  across  the  street  at  the  north-east  corner  of 
Little  Russell  Street,  in  Drury  Lane  ;  the  late  Mr. 
Thomas  Grignon  informed  me  that  he  had  often 
heard  his  father  say  that  this  sign  cost  £500.  In 
my  boyish  days  it  was  for  many  years  exposed  for 
sale  for  a  very  trifling  sum  at  a  broker's  shop  in 
Lower  Brook  Street,  Grosvenor  Square.  The  late 
Mr.  Crace,  of  Great  Queen  Street,  assured  me  that 
it  was  in  his  early  days  a  thing  that  country  people 
would  stand  and  gaze  at,  and  that  that  corner  of  the 
street  was  hardly  passable. 

Charles  Catton,2  Esq.,  R.A.,  was  also  in  early 
life  a  coach  and  sign  painter  ;  he  painted  a  lion  as  a 
sign  for  his  friend  Wright,  a  famous  coach-maker, 

1  Edwards  has  erroneously  given  Wale  the  credit  of  this  sign. — 
Smith.     Nathaniel  Clarkson  was  born  in  1724,  and  died  in  1795. — Ed. 

2  Charles  Catton,  the  landscape-painter,  was  born  in   1728,  was  a 
foundation  member  of  the  Royal  Academy,  and  died  in  1798. — Ed. 


IGNATIUS  SANCHO  51 


at  that  time  living  in  Long  Acre.  This  picture, 
though  it  has  weathered  many  a  storm,  is  still 
visible  at  the  coach- maker's  on  the  west  side  of 
Well  Street,  Oxford  Street.  Baker,1  a  famous 
flower-painter,  decorated  coach -panels  with  borders 
and  wreaths  of  flowers  ;  and  he  made  a  most 
splendid  display  of  his  taste  on  the  panels  of  the 
coach  of  the  famous  Dr.  Ward,  who  enjoyed  almost 
the  whole  practice  of  his  profession,  after  he  had 
so  successfully  set  the  sprained  thumb  of  King- 
George  II.  Richard  Wilson,  the  landscape-painter, 
once  condescended  to  paint  a  sign  of  the  '  Three 
Logger  Heads,'  for  the  house  so  called,  near  the 
spot  where  he  died. 

In  June,  1780,  Mr.  Nollekens  took  me  to  the 
house  of  Ignatius  Sancho,2  who  kept  a  grocer's,  or, 
rather,  chandler's  shop  at  No.  20,  Charles  Street, 
Westminster,  a  house  still  standing  at  the  south- 
west corner  of  Crown  Court.  Mr.  Nollekens  having 
recollected  that  he  had  promised  him  a  cast  of  his 
friend  ;  Sterne's  bust,  I  had  the  honour  of  carrying 
it ;  and  as  we  pushed  the  wicket  door,  a  little 
tinkling  bell,  the  usual  appendage    to  such  shops, 

1  John  Baker,  born  in  1736,  was  a  foundation  member  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  and  died  in  1771. — Ed. 

2  An  extraordinary  literary  character,  a  negro,  who  was  born  on 
board  a  slave-ship  in  1729.  He  was  patronized  by  the  Duke  of 
Montague,  who  made  him  his  butler,  and  left  him  a  legacy  and  an 
annuity  at  his  death,  when  he  took  the  shop  above-mentioned.  In  his 
leisure  hours  he  indulged  his  taste  for  music,  painting,  and  literature, 
which  procured  him  the  acquaintance  of  several  persons  of  distinction. 
He  was  the  author  of  some  pieces  of  poetry  and  a  tract  on  the 
'  Theory  of  Music  ';  and  his  letters,  with  his  life  by  Jekyll,  were  pub- 
lished after  his  death  for  the  benefit  of  his  family. — Smith. 


52  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


announced  its  opening.  We  drank  tea  with  Sanclio 
and  his  black  lady,  who  was  seated  when  we  entered 
in  the  corner  of  the  shop,  chopping  sugar,  sur- 
rounded by  her  little  \  Sanchonets.'  Sancho,  know- 
ing Mr.  Nollekens  to  be  a  loyal  man,  said  to  him, 
'  I  am  sure  you  will  be  pleased  to  hear  that  Lord 
George  Gordon  is  taken,  and  that  a  party  of  the 
guards  is  now  escorting  him  in  an  old  ramshackled 
coach  to  the  Tower.'  Nollekens  said  not  a  word, 
and  poor  Sancho  either  did  not  know  or  did  not 
recollect  that  he  was  addressing  a  Papist. 

I  can  also  recall  Sancho's  visiting  Mr.  Nollekens' 
studio  ;  he  spoke  well  of  art,  and  gave  the  f  ollowing* 
anecdote  of  the  late  Richard  Payne  Knight1  and 
Mortimer2  the  painter,  with  the  latter  of  whom  he 
was  extremely  intimate.  Mr.  Knight  happening  to 
call  upon  Mortimer  at  his  house  in  Church  Court, 
Covent  Garden,  expressed  his  uneasiness  at  the 
melancholy  mood  in  which  he  found  him.  '  Why, 
sir,'  observed  Mortimer,  '  I  have  many  noble  and 
generous  friends,  it  is  true  ;  but  of  all  my  patrons, 
I  don't  know  one  whom  I  could  now  ask  to  purchase 
an  hundred  guineas'  worth  of  draivings  of  me,  and 
I  am  at  this  moment  seriously  in  want  of  that  sum.' 
'  Well,  then,'  observed  Mr.  Knight,  '  bring  as  many 
sketches  as  you  would  part  with  for  that  sum  to  me 
to-morrow,  and  dine  with  me.'  This  he  did,  and 
enjoyed   his   bottle.     Mr.    Knight   gave    him    two 

1  This  eminent  antiquary  and  collector  was  born  in  1750,  and  died 
in  1824.— Ed. 

2  John  Hamilton  Mortimer,  born  in  1741,  was  an  eminent  cricketer 
and  a  painter  of  high  ambition.  He  was  elected  A.R.A.  at  the  close 
of  1778,  but  died  of  fever  a  few  weeks  later,  February  4,  1779.— Ed. 


THE  DUKE  OF  MONMOUTH'S  HOUSE  53 

hundred  guineas,  which  he  insisted  the  drawings 
were  worth ;  and  on  this  splendid  reception, 
Mortimer,  who  was  no  starter,  took  so  much  wine 
that  the  next  morning  he  knew  not  how  he  got 
home. 

About  twelve  o'clock  at  noon  his  bedside  was 
visited  by  the  late  '  Memory  Cooke,'  who,  after 
hearing  him  curse  his  stupidity  in  losing  his  two 
hundred  guineas,  produced  the  bag  !  c  Here,  my 
good  fellow  !'  cried  Cooke,  '  here  is  your  money. 
Fortunately  you  knocked  me  up,  and  emptied  your 
pockets  on  my  table,  after  which  I  procured  a 
coach  and  sent  you  home.' 

Ignatius  Sancho  died  December  14,  1780,  at  his 
house  already  mentioned,  and  was  buried  in  the 
Broadway,  Westminster. 

Mr.  Nollekens,  on  his  way  to  the  Roman  Catholic 
chapel  in  Duke  Street,  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  where 
he  was  christened,  stopped  to  show  me  the  dilapida- 
tions of  the  Duke  of  Monmouth's  house  in  Soho 
Square.  It  was  on  the  south  side,  and  occupied  the 
site  of  the  houses  which  now  stand  in  Bateman's 
Buildings  ;  and  though  the  workmen  were  employed 
in  pulling  it  down,  we  ventured  to  go  in.  The  gate 
entrance  was  of  massive  ironwork  supported  by 
stone  piers,  surmounted  by  the  crest  of  the  owner 
of  the  house  ;  and  within  the  gates  there  was  a 
spacious  courtyard  for  carriages.  The  hall  was 
ascended  by  steps.  There  were  eight  rooms  on  the 
ground-floor  ;  the  principal  one  was  a  dining-room 
towards  the  south,  the  carved  and  gilt  panels  of 
which  had  contained  whole-length  pictures.     At  the 


54  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

corners  of  the  ornamented  ceiling,  which  was  of 
plaster,  and  over  the  chimney-piece,  the  Dnke  of 
Monmouth's  arms  were  displayed. 

From  a  window  we  descended  into  a  paved  yard, 
surrounded  by  a  red  brick  wall  with  heavy  stone 
copings,  which  was,  to  the  best  of  my  recollection, 
full  twenty-five  feet  in  height.  The  staircase  was 
of  oak,  the  steps  very  low,  and  the  landing-places 
were  tessellated  with  woods  of  light  and  dark 
colours,  similar  to  those  now  remaining  on  the 
staircase  of  Lord  Russell's  house,  late  Lowe's  Hotel, 
Covent  Garden,  and  in  several  rooms  of  the  British 
Museum. 

As  we  ascended,  I  remember  Mr.  Nollekens 
noticing  the  busts  of  Seneca,  Caracalla,  Trajan, 
Adrian,  and  several  others,  upon  ornamented 
brackets.  The  principal  room  on  the  first-floor, 
which  had  not  been  disturbed  by  the  workmen,  was 
lined  with  blue  satin,  superbly  decorated  with 
pheasants  and  other  birds  in  gold.  The  chimney- 
piece  was  richly  ornamented  with  fruit  and  foliage, 
similar  to  the  carvings  which  surround  the  altar  of 
St.  James's  Church,  Piccadilly,  so  beautifully  exe- 
cuted by  Grinling  Gibbons.  In  the  centre  over  this 
chimney-piece,  within  a  wreath  of  oak-leaves,  there 
was  a  circular  recess  which  evidently  had  been 
designed  for  the  reception  of  a  bust.  The  beads  of 
the  panels  of  the  brown  window- shutters,  which 
were  very  lofty,  were  gilt ;  and  the  piers  between 
the  windows,  from  stains  upon  the  silk,  had  pro- 
bably been  filled  with  looking-glasses.  The  scaffold- 
ing, ladders,  and  numerous  workmen  rendered  it  too 


MARYLEBONE  BASIN  55 

dangerous  for  us  to  go  higher,  or  see  more  of  this 
most  interesting  house. 

My  father  had,  however,  made  a  drawing  of  the 
external  front  of  it,  which  I  engraved  for  my  first 
work,  entitled  '  Antiquities  of  London,'  which  has 
been  noticed  by  Mr.  Pennant1  in  his  valuable  and 
entertaining  anecdotes  of  the  Metropolis. 

One  Sunday  morning  Mr.  Nollekens  took  me  to 
see  the  boys  bathe  in  Marylebone  basin.  As  we 
were  ^ohis:,  our  attention  was  engaged  by  the 
beadles  of  the  parish  seizing  the  clothes  of  the  lads 
who  had  gone  into  the  small  pond  called  Cockney 
Ladle,  supplied  with  water  by  an  arm  which  looked 
like  a  ladle  from  the  basin  ;  this  Cockney  Ladle 
stood  on  the  north  of  Portland  Chapel,  very  near 
the  spot  now  occupied  by  Mr.  Booth,  the  bookseller, 
in  Duke  Street.  The  basin — which  was  a  very 
large  circular  and  deep  pond,  fatal  to  many  an 
inexperienced  youth — was  farther  in  the  fields  on 
the  site  of  part,  of  Portland  Place  and  Mansfield 
Street.  A  small  portion  of  the  pond,  denominated 
c  The  Six-and-Thirty,'  still  remains  on  the  west 
side  of  the  once-intended  Carmarthen  Square,  at 
the  end  of  Upper  Gower  Street,  nearly  opposite  to 
the  house  in  which  I  now  reside — a  part  of  the 
town,  until  very  lately,  so  perfectly  healthy  and 
free  from  the  London  smoke  that  at  No.  33  in 
Gower  Street — a  house  till  within  these  few  years 
inhabited  by  the  late  Colonel  Sutherland,  well 
known  at  print-auctions,  as  well  as  to  portrait- 
collectors,    as    a    most    extensive    embellisher   of 

1  Thomas  Pennant,  the  naturalist  (172G-1798). — Ed. 


56  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Clarendon's  '  History  of  his  Own  Times ' — grapes 
were  ripened  by  the  sun  in  the  open  air  at  the  back- 
parlour  window. 

Lord  Eldon  often  speaks  of  the  fine  fruit  of 
Gowrer  Street,  which  his  lordship  enjoyed  when  he 
lived  in  the  house  now  No.  42  ;  indeed,  he  has 
also  spoken  in  open  court  of  the  sad  effect  the 
smoke  of  London  had  upon  his  garden  in  Gower 
Street.  A  still  more  extraordinary  fact  is,  that 
even  so  late  as  the  year  1800,  William  Bentham, 
Esq.,  of  No.  6,  Upper  Gower  Street  (a  gentleman 
whose  well-chosen  collection  of  English  topography 
is  unquestionably  the  most  select  and  perfect  of 
any  formed  within  my  memory),  had  nearly  twenty - 
five  dozen  of  the  finest-looking  and  most  delicious 
nectarines,  all  fit  for  the  table,  gathered  from  three 
completely  exposed  trees  ;  and  even  since  that  time, 
the  same  garden,  of  the  same  gentleman,  has  pro- 
duced the  richest-flavoured  celerv  in  the  greatest 
abundance. 

The  orchestra  of  Marylebone  Gardens,  before 
which  I  have  listened  with  my  grandmother  to  hear 
Tommy  Lowe  sing,  stood  upon  the  site  of  the  house 
now  No.  17  in  Devonshire  Place,  and  very  near 
where  Mr.  Fountain's  boarding-school  stood,  nearly 
opposite  to  the  old  church,  still  standing  in  High 
Street.  Mr.  Fountain,  who  succeeded  Mr.  De  la 
Place  in  this  school,  wras  once  wralking  with  Handel 
round  Marylebone  Gardens,  and  upon  hearing  music 
which  he  could  not  understand,  observed  to  Handel, 
'  This  is  d— d  stuff !'— c  It  may  be  d— d  stuff,  but 
it  is  mine,'  rejoined  Handel. 


NOLLEKENS  HABITS  tj 


Upon  the  death  of  my  mother,  in  1779,  Mr. 
Nollekens,  upon  seeing  some  of  my  attempts  in 
wax-modelling,  kindly  invited  me  into  his  studio. 
At  that  time  my  father  was  his  principal  assistant, 
and  there  I  was  employed  in  making  drawings  from 
his  models  of  monuments,  assisting  in  casting,  and 
finally,  though  in  a  very  unimportant  degree,  and 
with  the  humblest  talent,  in  carving  ;  but  I  must 
state  that  I  was  entirely  supported  by  my  father, 
and  I  solemnly  declare  that  from  the  hour  of  my 
first  seeing  Mr.  Nollekens  till  the  time  of  his  deatli 
I  never  received,  either  directly  or  indirectly,  the 
slightest  remuneration  from  him,  though  whilst  I 
was  with  him  I  have  often  stood  to  him  as  a  model. 
Indeed,  the  only  present  he  ever  made  me  was  three 
boxes  of  what  had  been  black  chalk,  which  he 
brought  from  Florence  ;  but  it  was  so  gray  and 
rotten  that  it  would  not  bear  cutting,  and  was 
therefore  worth  nothing.  This  he  knew  upon 
asking  me  how  I  liked  it,  and  his  answer  was, 
'  Well,  never  mind,  I  shall  give  yon  cause  to 
remember  me  in  a  better  way.' 

My  being  often  closeted  with  him  as  his  model, 
assisting  him  in  casting,  etc.,  gave  me  frequent 
opportunities  of  seeing  and  hearing  much,  particu- 
larly of  his  domestic  habits,  and  the  observations 
made  by  his  sitters  and  visitors,  who  were  persons 
of  learning,  rank,  or  beauty.  As  I  have  sometimes 
diverted  my  friends  with  a  good-lmmonred  imitation 
of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nollekens,  I  shall  occasionally 
insert  a  few  of  their  dialogues,  which  have  either 
fallen  under  my  own  notice  or  were  related  to  me 


58  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


by  their  old  servant,  Elizabeth  Rosina  Clements. 
She  was  a  woman  possessing  a  considerable  share  of 
drollery  ;  and  from  her  complexion  being  of  a 
chestnut  -  brown  colour,  somewhat  tinctured  with 
olive,  she  acquired  from  the  shopkeepers,  particu- 
larly those  of  Oxford  Market,  the  nickname  of 
Black  Bet,  but  from  the  artists  the  more  classical 
appellation  of  Bronze,  under  which  she  will  here- 
after be  mentioned.  Indeed,  she  might  very  well 
call  to  mind  the  expression  of  Petrarch,  who 
describes  his  female  servant  as  being  '  brown  as  a 
Libyan  desert,  and  dry  as  a  mummy.' 

Langforcl,  who  was  the  most  fashionable  auctioneer 
of  his  day,  occupied  the  rooms  in  Co  vent  Garden 
now  held  bv  Messrs.  Robins,  in  the  largest  of  which 
he  sold  that  truly  valuable  collection  of  prints  and 
drawings  accumulated  by  Thomas  Hudson,1  the 
master  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  and  the  most 
celebrated  portrait-painter  of  his  time.  Though  no 
very  great  artist,  Hudson  showed  considerable  ambi- 
tion and  taste  in  his  selection  of  the  best  specimens 
of  art  for  his  portfolios,  particularly  in  the  produc- 
tions of  the  Dutch  schools.  The  choice  impressions 
which  he  had  accumulated  from  the  plates  of  Rem- 
brandt, and  his  various  and  numerous  drawings  also 
from  the  hand  of  that  wonderful  master,  would 
lead  us  to  conclude  him  to  have  been  his  greatest 
favourite ;  indeed,  so  extensive  and  precious  were 
they  that,  I  am  informed,  any  ten  collections  united 
would  not  have  equalled  his  either  in  merit  or  in 
number. 

1  Thomas  Hudson  died  in  1779,  aged  seventy-eight. — Ed. 


THE  STREETS  OF  LONDON  59 

At  this  sale  Mr.  Nollekens  was  a  constant  atten- 
dant, and  lie  generally  took  me  with  him.  I  recollect 
Sir  Joshua  Reynolds — who  was  present  one  evening 
when  a  drawing  was  knocked  down  to  his  pupil  and 
agent,  Mr.  Score1 — after  he  had  expatiated  upon  the 
extraordinary  powrers  of  Rembrandt,  assuring  a 
gentleman  with  whom  he  was  conversing  that  the 
effect  which  pleased  him  most  in  all  his  own  pictures 
was  that  displayed  in  the  one  of  Lord  Ligonier  on 
horseback,  of  which  there  is  an  engraving  by  Fisher, 
the  chiaro-oscnro  of  which  he  conceived  from  a  rnde 
woodcut  upon  a  halfpenny  ballad,  which  he  pur- 
chased from  the  wrall  of  St.  Anne's  Church  in 
Princes  Street. 

Another  time,  as  we  were  going  to  view  the  same 
curious  collection,  Mr.  Nollekens  stopped  at  the 
corner  of  Rathbone  Place,  and  observed  that  when 
he  was  a  little  boy  his  mother  often  took  him  to 
the  top  of  that  street  to  walk  by  the  side  of  a  long 
pond  near  a  windmill,  which  then  stood  on  the  site 
of  the  chapel  in  Charlotte  Street ;  and  that  a  half- 
penny was  paid  by  every  person  at  a  hatch  belonging 
to  the  miller  for  the  privilege  of  wralking  in  his 
grounds.  He  also  told  me  that  his  mother  took 
him  through  another  halfpenny  hatch  in  the  fields 
between  Oxford  Road  and  Grosvenor  Square,  the 
north  side  of  which  was  then  building.  When  we 
got  to  the  brewhonse  between  Rathbone  Place  and 
the  end  of  Tottenham  Court  Road  he  said  he 
recollected  thirteen  large  and  fine  wralnnt  -  trees 
standing  on  the  north  side  of  the  highway  between 

1  William  Score,  the  Devonshire  portrait-painter. — Ed. 


60  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 

what  was  then  vulgarly  called  Hanover  Yard,  after- 
wards Hanway  Yard,  and  now  Hanway  Street,  and 
the  Castle  Inn  beyond  the  Star  Brewery. 

I  remember  ^oiiis;  with  Mr.  Nollekens  to  see  his 
old  friend  Athenian  Stuart,  though  he  had  treated 
him  so  scurvily.  Stuart  lived  on  the  south  side  of 
Leicester  Fields ;  he  had  built  a  large  room  at  the 
back  of  his  house,  in  which  were  several  of  his 
drawings,  particularly  those  he  had  made  for  a 
continuation  of  his  work  ;  they  were  in  body 
colours,  and  in  stvle  resembled  those  of  Marco 
Ricci.  His  parlour,  where  we  remained  until  a 
shower  of  rain  was  over,  was  decorated  with  some 
of  Hogarth's  most  popular  prints,  and  upon  a  fire- 
screen he  had  pasted  an  impression  of  the  plate 
called  the  '  Periwigs,'  a  print  which  Mr.  Stuart 
always  showed  his  visitors  as  Hogarth's  satire  upon 
his  first  volume  of  '  Athenian  Antiquities.' 

Mr.  Stuart,  though  short,  was  not  a  fat,  but 
rather  a  heavy-looking,  man,  and  his  face  declared 
him  to  be  fond  of  what  is  called  friendly  society. 
In  his  later  days  he  regularly  frequented  a  public - 
house  on  the  north  side  of  Leicester  Fields,  of  the 
sign  of  the  Feathers,  which  then  stood  upon  the 
site  of  part  of  the  ground  of  Mr.  Burford's 
Panorama  ;  and  of  these  friendly  meetings  he 
would  frequently  endeavour  to  persuade  Nollekens 
to  become  a  member. 

When  we  had  left  Mr.  Stuart's  house,  Mr. 
Nollekens  pointed  out  the  one  in  St.  Martin's 
Street  that  had  been  inhabited  by  Sir  Isaac 
Newton,  which  he  said  was  then  occupied  by  his 


COLONEL  KING  61 


friend  Dr.  Burney,1  who  was  visited  by  all  the 
learned  personages  of  the  day.  I  have  been 
favoured  with  a  curious  anecdote  of  Dr.  Burney 
and  Mr.  Nollekens  by  my  friend  Lieutenant- Colonel 
Phillips,  one  of  the  two  surviving  gentlemen  who 
went  round  the  world  with  Captain  Cook,  which  the 
reader  will  find  in  a  subsequent  page. 

Whilst  we  were  standing  at  the  end  of  Rathbone 
Place  waiting  for  a  coach — for  Mr.  Nollekens  now 
and  then  indulged  in  a  shilling  fare,  particularly 
when  he  was  going  into  the  city  to  purchase  stock, 
or  to  the  Royal  Academy,  when  he  was  chosen 
visitor — he  said,  pointing  to  the  house  east  of  the 
undertaker's,  now  No.  23 :  i  There  lived  Colonel 
King,2  one  of  my  father's  oldest  friends ;  he  was 
a  very  great  collector  of  all  sorts  of  singular 
things,  and  had  a  very  curious  old  shield  which 
belonged  to  the  famous  Dr.  Woodward,3  who  was 
intimately  acquainted  with  the  great  Sir  Christopher 
Wren. 

'  Colonel  King  was  very  good-natured  to  me  and 
my  brothers,  and  whenever  my  father  used  to  take 
us  to   drink  coffee  with  him,  we   had   our   three- 

1  Charles  Burney,  the  historian  of  music  (1726-1814). — Ed. 

2  Colonel  Kichard  King  died  in  1767,  in  his  eighty-fourth  year.  He 
was  visited  by  Pope  and  other  celebrated  men,  and  was  executor  to 
Dr.  Woodward. — Smith. 

3  This  shield,  which  is  now  in  the  British  Museum,  has  been 
erroneously  attributed  to  Benvenuto  Cellini.  It  is  certainly  of  the 
time  of  Henry  VIII.,  but  of  very  coarse  and  inferior  workmanship. 
I  find  by  a  letter  in  the  fourth  volume  of  '  Biographia  Adversaria,' 
in  the  British  Museum,  that  the  Doctor's  shield  sold  at  the  sale  of 
Colonel  King,  to  whom  he  had  bequeathed  it,  for  the  sum  of  £40. — 
Smith. 


62  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

cornered  silver-laced  hats  on ;  so  we  had  on 
Sundays,  when  we  used  to  go  into  St.  James's 
Park,  with  our  ruffles  and  canes  ;  I  remember  it 
very  well.'  When  we  had  entered  Soho  Square, 
among  many  other  remarks,  he  said  that  when  he 
was  a  little  boy,  and  lived  in  Dean  Street,  where 
he  was  born,  at  the  house  now  No.  28,  there  were 
no  fewer  than  four  Ambassadors  lived  in  that 
Square,  and  that  at  that  time  it  was  the  most 
fashionable  place  for  the  nobility.1  He  also  told 
me  that  Baptiste,  the  famous  flower-painter,  with 
whom  he  said  his  father  was  extremely  intimate, 
lived  and  died  in  the  corner  house,  pointing  to  the 
one  now  No.  18.  'And  do  you  know,'  added  he, 
4  that  I  have  often  stood  for  hours  together,  to  see 
the  water  run  out  of  the  jugs  of  the  old  river-gods 
into  the  basin  in  the  middle  of  the  square  ;  but,' 
he  continued,  c  the  water  never  would  run  out  of 
their  jugs,  but  when  the  windmill  was  going  round 
at  the  top  of  Rathbone  Place.'  This  windmill 
stood  upon  the  site  of  Percy  Chapel,  in  Charlotte 
Street,  and  the  spring,  wljich  supplied  the  long 
pond  before  it,  now  remains  in  the  cellar  of  Elisha, 
a  bricklayer,  behind  the  chapel. 

When  we  arrived  at  the  French  'Change,  Nolle- 

1  It  appears  from  the  books  of  the  parish  of  St.  Anne,  which  I  have 
frequently  searched,  that  between  the  years  1708  and  1772  the  follow- 
ing persons  of  rank  had  inhabited  Soho  Square,  viz.  :  Lord  Berkeley, 
Lord  Byron,  Lord  Carlisle,  Lord  Grimstone,  Lord  Howard,  Lord 
Leicester,  Sir  Thomas  Mansel,  Lord  Macclesfield,  Lord  Morpeth, 
Lord  Nottingham,  Lord  Onslow,  Lord  Peterborough,  Lord  Pierre- 
point,  Lord  Pigot,  Sir  Cloudesley  Shovel,  and  several  Ambassadors. — 
Smith. 


WALKS  IN  LONDON  63 


kens  exclaimed  :  '  There,  Tom,  stand  here,  and  yon 
will  see  the  entrances  of  nine  streets  ;  my  mother 
showed  them  to  me.  There,  stand  just  there,  and 
don't  turn  vonr  head,  onlv  vonr  eyes  ' — niacins:  me, 
with  both  his  hands  upon  my  shoulders,  at  about 
fifteen  feet  from  Grafton  Street,  nearly  in  the 
centre  of  Moor  Street.  c  There,  now  look  to  the 
left :  is  not  there  Monmouth  Street  ?  now  let  your 
eye  run  along  over  the  way  to  the  first  opening : 
that's  Great  White  Lion  Street ;  well,  now  bring 
your  eye  back  to  the  opposite  street  in  front  of 
you  :  that's  Little  Earl  Street.  Throw  your  eye 
over  the  Seven  Dials,  and  you'll  see  Queen  Street 
and  Earl  Street ;  well,  now  look  on  the  right  of 
Little  Earl  Street,  and  you  will  see  Tower  Street : 
well,  now  stand  still,  mind,  don't  move,  bring  your 
eye  back  towards  you,  and  turn  it  a  little  to  the 
right,  and  you  will  see  West  Street  ;  bring  it 
nearer  to  the  right,  and  there's  Grafton  Street ; 
and  then,  look  down  at  your  toes,  and  you'll  find 
yourself  standing  in  Moor  Street.' 

He  also  made  me  his  companion  in  his  Sunday 
evening  walks,  as  he  of  later  years  did  Joseph 
Bonomi,1  a  truly  deserving  youth,  to  whom  it  was 
generally  supposed  that  he  would  have  left  a  con- 
siderable part  of  his  immense  property,  from  his 
long-continued  attachment  to  him  from  his  birth  ; 
but  he,  however,  as  well  as  many  other  real  friends, 
was  disappointed. 

1  This  gentleman,  who  was  born  in  1796,  survived  until  1878.  He 
was  curator  of  the  Soane  Museum,  and  a  distinguished  Egyptolo- 
gist.—Ed. 


64  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 

In  one  of  our  amusing  perambulations,  he 
stopped  opposite  to  a  public-house  in  Vine  Street, 
Piccadilly,  very  near  the  house  formerly  occupied 
by  his  master,  Scheemakers,  and  said :  '  There, 
Tom,  stand  just  there  ;  now,  mind  what  I  am 
going  to  tell,  and  listen  to  it  ;  it  was  in  that  very 
house,  over  the  way,  I  got  the  first  print  I  ever 
possessed  in  my  life.' 

This  was  an  impression  of  Pesne's  engraving  of 
the  '  Death  of  Eudamidas,'  after  a  picture  painted 
by  Nicholas  Poussin  ;  and  the  way  in  which 
Xollekens  became  possessed  of  this  print  was  both 
cunning  and  curious.  He  knew  that  the  landlord 
of  the  public-house,  with  whom  he  frequently  held 
conversations  as  to  bell-tolling,  had  sailed  and 
fought  with  Admiral  Vernon,  and  knowing,  also, 
that  he  could  purchase  of  another  bell -tolling 
friend  a  large  engraving  of  the  '  Siege  of  Porto 
Bello,'  for  the  small  sum  of  one  shilling,  as  it  was 
the  size  of  Poussin's  print,  he  ventured  to  propose 
an  exchange.  To  this  proposition  the  landlord 
made  no  objection,  nor  did  his  wife  ;  so  away  little 
Joey  posted  to  his  friend,  who  was  a  broker,  living 
in  Great  Brewer  Street,  parted  with  his  shilling, 
and  on  the  next  washing-day,  when  Mrs.  Schee- 
makers requested  him,  as  the  maids  were  busy,  to 
go  for  the  porter,  he  took  ;  Porto  Bello '  under  his 
arm,  with  as  much  joy  as  the  old  Admiral  received 
the  enemy's  colours,  and  obtained  the  print  which 
he  had  so  often  looked  at  with  so  longing  an  eye. 
Afterwards,  when  he  became  possessed  of  wealth, 
he  formed  a  very  capital   collection  of  Poussin's 


FLEET  PRISONERS  65 

works,1  from  which  it  has  been  asserted  that  he 
borrowed  many  attitudes  for  his  monumental 
figures.  Poussin's  draperies  were  likewise  so 
highly  esteemed  by  him  that  he  frequently  adopted 
them,  as  this  painter's  drapery  falls  well,  mostly  in 
grand  and  broad  folds,,  and  is  unquestionably  the 
easiest  for  carving,  having  no  flutter,  which  is  a 
style  not  only  troublesome  to  execute  in  marble, 
but  extremely  expensive  to  cut,  and  bad  in  effect 
when  accomplished. 

At  another  time,  when  he  took  me  with  him  to 
his  stockbroker's,  as  we  were  going  up  Ludgate 
Hill,  he  said  that  he  recollected  his  mother  taking 
him,  when  he  was  only  four  years  old,  to  see  St. 
Paul's  ;  and  that,  in  going  up  that  street,  he 
observed  a  man  running  backwards  and  forwards 
shaking  a  box,  into  which  many  of  the  passengers 
put  money,  and  that  she  told  him  it  was  for  the 
poor  prisoners  in  the  Fleet,  being  called  'the 
running  box.'  In  Marcellus  Lauron's  '  Cries  of 
London,'  published  about  the  year  1710,  there  is  a 
representation  of  such  a  person,  with  his  cry  of 
4  Kemember  the  poor  prisoners  !'  inscribed  beneath 
him.  At  his  back  a  capacious  covered  basket  is 
suspended  by  leathern  straps  round  his  arms  for 
broken  victuals  ;  and  he  carries  in  one  hand  a  staff, 

1  This  interesting  and  truly  valuable  collection  of  Poussin's  prints, 
to  which  Mr.  Nollekens  had  added  even  in  his  most  feeble  and 
childish  state,  was  sold,  after  his  death,  by  Mr.  Evans,  of  Pall  Mall, 
together  with  many  other  fine  engravings  which  Mr.  Nollekens  had 
indulged  in  from  several  of  Langford's  and  Christie's  sales,  to  the 
latter  of  which  rooms  he  was  a  constant  visitor  for  nearly  half  a 
■century. — Smith. 

5 


66  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

and  in  the  other  a  small  round  deep  box,  with  an 
aperture  in  the  lid  for  receiving  of  alms  in  money. 
Nollekens  always  spoke  well  of  his  mother, 
observing  that  she  was  a  very  curious  woman, 
and  in  his  recollections  of  her  stated  that  she  pos- 
sessed an  ivory  model  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre  ; 
that  she  remembered  seeing  the  rebels,  in  1745, 
brought  into  London,  confined  at  the  backs  of 
the  horse-soldiers  ;  that  they  were  brought  from 
Scotland  through  Tottenham  Court  Road,  along^ 
Hog  Lane,  now  called  Crown  Street,  on  their 
way  to  the  Horse  Guards  ;  and  that  she  used 
to  take  in  a  newspaper,  entitled  All  Alive  and 
Merry;  or,  The  London  Daily  Post,  which  was 
published  at  a  farthing,  and  printed  by  c  A  Merry 
Man.'1  The  full  title  and  imprint  of  this  curious 
paper  are,  4  All- Alive  and  Merry ;  or,  The  London 
Daily  Post.  London  :  Printed  for  A.  Merryman, 
and  sold  by  the  Hawkers.'  It  consisted  of  a  small 
folio  half- sheet,  having   three  columns    of   letter- 

1  The  following  anecdote,  given  at  this  place  by  Smith  in  the  first 
edition  of  his  '  Life  of  Nollekens,'  was  omitted  in  the  second,  I  know 
not  for  what  reason  :  '  I  have  several  times  heard  Mr.  Nollekens 
observe  that  he  frequently  had  seen  Hogarth,  when  a  young  man, 
saunter  round  Leicester  Fields,  with  his  master's  sickly  child  hanging 
its  head  over  his  shoulder  ;  and  whilst  we  are  speaking  of  that  eminent 
and  eccentric  artist,  I  may  remark  that  my  father  once  asked  Barry 
the  painter  if  he  had  ever  seen  Hogarth.  "  Yes,  once,"  he  replied. 
"  I  was  walking  with  Joe  Nollekens  through  Cranbourne  Alley,  when, 
he  exclaimed,  '  There,  there's  Hogarth.'  '  What  !'  said  I,  '  that  little 
man  in  the  sky-blue  coat  ?!  Off  I  ran,  and  though  I  lost  sight  of  him 
only  for  a  moment  or  two,  when  I  turned  the  corner  into  Cattle  Street 
he  was  patting  one  of  two  quarrelling  boys  on  the  back,  and  looking 
steadfastly  at  the  expression  in  the  coward's  face,  cried,  ( D — n  him  I 
if  I  would  take  it  of  him  !     At  him  again  !' "  '--Ed. 


NEWSPAPERS  67 


press  on  each  side  ;  and  several  specimens  of  it 
may  be  seen  in  the  late  Dr.  Burney's  Collection  of 
Newspapers  in  the  British  'Museum,  vol.  iii.  for 
1741.  It  is  probable  that  the  London  Gazette  may 
be  considered  as  the  origin  of  most  of  the  cheap 
and  popular  news  journals  of  the  last  century,  since 
the  name  of  that  paper  w^as  derived  from  one  first 
published  at  Venice,  the  price  of  which  was  a  coin 
called  a  gazet,  which,  says  Coryat  in  his  '  Crudi- 
ties '  (London,  1776,  8vo.,  vol.  ii.,  p.  15),  4  is  almost 
a  penny,  whereof  ten  do  make  a  liver,  that  is  nine- 
pence.' 

The  first  of  this  paper  printed  in  England  super- 
seded the  Intelligence  and  News,  conducted  by 
Eoger  L'Estrange,  Esq.,  and  appeared  in  1665, 
No.  1  containing  the  public  events  from  November 
7  to  14,  under  the  title  of  the  Oxford  Gazette,  it 
being  published  in  that  city  every  Tuesday,  since 
the  Court  was  assembled  there  on  account  of  the 
plague  being  in  London.  It  was,  however,  also 
reprinted  in  the  Metropolis,  and  upon  the  removal 
of  the  Court  the  name  was  altered  to  that  of  the 
London  Gazette,  the  first  of  which,  No.  24,  Febru- 
ary 1  to  5,  1665-66,  was  published  on  a  Monday. 
Those  papers,  however,  the  names  of  which  were 
expressive  of  their  price,  do  not  seem  to  have  been 
published  until  half  a  century  afterwards  ;  but  on 
July  19,  1715,  appeared  No.  1  of  The  Penny  Post; 
on  March  13  following,  No.  1  of  The  Penny  Post ; 
or,  Tradesman  s  Select  Pacquet ;  on  October  19 , 
1720,  No.  1  of  The  Penny  Weekly  Journal;  or, 
Saturday  Evening's  Entertainment ;  and  in  1724-25 


68  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

a  vet  cheaper  publication  was  printed,  called  The 
Halfpenny  London  Journal;  or,  Tlie  British 
Oracle ;  whilst  three  other  halfpenny  posts  Avere 
published  three  times  every  week  (Nichols's 
'  Literary  Anecdotes  of  the  Eighteenth  Century,' 
London,  1812,  8vo.,  vol.  i.,  p.  312  ;  vol.  iv.,  pp.  58, 
86,  89,  90,  92,  94). 

The  farthing  posts,  however,  appear  chiefly  to 
have  been  in  circulation  durino;  the  vears  1740-1743  : 
and  in  the  Gentleman's  Magazine  for  November, 
1740,  vol.  x.,  pp.  557,  558,  the  'Craftsman'  of 
November  22  complains  that  the  revenue  was 
greatly  defrauded  by  the  printers  and  publishers 
of  halfpenny  and  farthing  posts,  which  Avere 
publicly  Amended  about  the  streets,  without  stamps, 
in  equal  defiance  both  of  the  law  and  the  penalty. 
It  is  added,  that  though  they  had  been  frequently 
informed  against,  yet  that  the  persons  concerned 
in  them  Avere  supposed  to  be  such  '  poor,  low 
AA-retches,'  living  in  obscure  parts  of  the  town,  or 
in  the  rules  of  the  Fleet,  and  other  prisons,  that 
their  discoA^ery  Avould  be  very  difficult  ;  whilst  a 
suspicion  is  also  hinted  that  they  were  supported 
by  persons  in  power  against  the  opposition  papers 
and  publishers.  In  plate  iv.  of  the  '  Rake's  Pro- 
gress '  Hogarth  has  introduced  a  boy  intently 
occupied  in  reading  a  paper,  on  which  is  inscribed, 
'  The  Farthing  Post.'  The  stamping  of  neAvs- 
papers  on  single  sheets  or  half-sheets  first  took 
place  on  August  2,  1712. 

But  to  return  now  from  Mr.  Nollekens'  reminis- 
cences  to   his    own   memoirs.     The   parsimonious 


MRS.  NOLLE  KENS'  PARSIMONY  69 

disposition  of  his  partner  seemed  to  take  no  delight 
in  alleviating  the  sorrows  of  the  widow  or  assisting 
the  endeavours  of  the  fatherless  ;  at  least,  I  never 
heard  of  her  trespassing  on  her  purse  that  way  : 
on  the  contrary,  she  would,  like  Penny's  picture  of 
a  quack-doctor,1  look  about  for  the  bit  of  bacon  to 
take  from  the  distressed  family,  as  will  appear  by 
the  following  trait  of  character.  At  the  corner  of 
her  house  there  was  a  small  part  of  the  street 
railed  in,  on  which  she  gave  a  poor  woman  leave 
to  place  a  table  with  a  few  apples  for  sale  upon  a 
bit  of  an  old  napkin. 

To  this  miserablv-hooded  widow  she  was  seen  to 
go,  when  she  intended  to  treat  the  family  with  a 
dumpling,  with  the  question  of,  c  Pray,  Goody,  how 
many  apples  can  you  let  me  have  for  a  penny  ?' 
'  Bless  your  kindness  !  you  shall  have  three.' 
J  Three  !'  exclaimed  the  lady,  smiling  ;  '  no,  you 
must  let  me  have  four ;'  and  touching  her  left 
thumb  with  the  forefinger  of  her  right  hand,  she 
continued,  c  f or  there's  my  husband,  myself,  and 
two  servants,  and  we  must  have  one  apiece  !' 
s  Well,'  observed  the  miserable  dependent,  c you 
must  take  them  !'  Whilst  eighteen-pence  was  the 
price  of  half  a  calf's  head,  it  was  a  dish  of  which 
she  was  c  passionately  fond ' ;  but  when  it  exceeded 
that  amount,  something  else  was  thought  of  '  by 
way  of  a  change ' :  indeed,  she  would  observe  that 

1  From  this  picture  by  Penny,  who  was  Professor  of  Painting  in 
the  Royal  Academy,  there  is  an  engraving  entitled  '  The  Rapacious 
Quack.'— Smith.  Edward  Penny  (1714-1791)  was  a  foundation 
member  of  the  Royal  Academy,  and  the  earliest  Professor  of  Painting 
there. — Ed. 


70  NOLLE  KENS  AND  LILS  TIMES 

'  those  people  who  live  aloof  from  the  blandish- 
ments of  a  Court  have  little  occasion  for  a  super- 
fluity at  their  tables.' 

When  she  went  to  Oxford  Market  to  beat  the 
rounds,  in  order  to  discover  the  cheapest  chops, 
she  would  walk  round  several  times  to  give  her 
dog  Cerberus  an  opportunity  of  picking  up  scraps. 
However,  of  this  mode  of  manoeuvring  she  was  at 
last  ashamed,  bv  the  rude  remarks  of  the  vulgar 
butchers,  who  had  been  complained  of  to  her  Nolly, 
for  having  frequently  cried  out:  'Here  comes  Mrs. 
Nollekens  and  her  bull-bitch  !' 

She  took  a  particular  pleasure  in  assisting  her 
friends  at  card-parties  with  '  economical  recipes,'  of 
which  she  accumulated  a  tolerable  stock ;  and  the 
following  was  one  she  much  recommended  to  the 
mammas  of  very  delicate  young  ladies,  for  whom 
the  physician  had  prescribed  ass's  milk  :  'To  make 
Mock  Ass's  Milk. — Three  parts  barley-water  and 
one  part  milk,  to  be  boiled  together,  and  sweetened 
with  fine  sugar  ;  half  an  ounce  of  barley  to  a  pint, 
the  first  water  to  be  thrown  away.'  There  was  one 
recipe  which  Mr.  Nollekens  always  wrote  himself 
on  little  ragged  strips  of  paper,  which  he  cut  ofi 
the  margins  of  his  prints,  and  of  which  he  kept 
several  in  his  pocket-book,  to  give  to  any  persons 
he  met  afflicted  with  the  jaundice,  and  now  and 
then  a  pert  jackanapes,  by  way  of  a  quiz,  would 
apply  for  one  :  '  For  jaundice,  take  every  morning 
a  new-laid  egg  ;  let  it  be  broke  into  a  cup,  and 
swallow  it,  the  white  and  the  yolk.' 

During  the  time  I  was  with   him,  he  now  and 


BUST  OF  DR.  JOHNSON  ft 


then  gave  a  dinner,  particularly  when  his  steadfast 
friend  Lord  Yarborough,  then  the  Hon.  Mr.  Pelham, 
sent  his  annual  present  of  venison  ;  and  it  is  most 
surprising  to  consider  how  many  persons  of  good 
sense  and  high  talent  visited  Mrs.  Nollekens, 
though  it  probably  was  principally  owing  to  the 
^ood  character  her  father  and  sister  held  in  society. 
Dr.  Johnson  and  Miss  Williams  were  often  there, 
and  they  generally  arrived  in  a  hackney-coach,  on 
account  of  Miss  Williams'  blindness.  When  the 
Doctor  sat  to  Mr.  Nollekens  for  his  bust,  he  was 
very  much  displeased  at  the  manner  in  which  the 
head  had  been  loaded  with  hair,  which  the  sculptor 
insisted  upon,  as  it  made  him  look  more  like  an 
ancient  poet.  The  sittings  were  not  very  favour- 
able, which  rather  vexed  the  artist,  who,  upon 
opening  the  street-door,  a  vulgarity  he  was  addicted 
to,  peevishly  whined  :  '  Now,  Doctor,  you  did  say 
you  would  give  my  busto  half  an  hour  before 
dinner,  and  the  dinner  has  been  waiting  this  long 
time.'  To  which  the  Doctor's  reply  was :  '  Bow- 
wow-wow !' 

The  bust  is  a  wonderfully  fine  one  and  very  like, 
but  certainly  the  sort  of  hair  is  objectionable  ; 
having  been  modelled  from  the  flowing  locks  of 
a  sturdy  Irish  beggar,  originally  a  street  pavior, 
who,  after  he  had  sat  an  hour,  refused  to  take  a 
shilling,  stating  that  he  could  have  made  more  by 
begging  ! 

Dr.  Johnson  also  considered  this  bust  like  him, 
but,  whilst  he  acknowledged  the  sculptor's  ability 
in    his    art,  he  could  not    avoid   observing   to    his 


72  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

friend  Bos  well,  when  they  were  looking  at  it  in 
Nollekens'  studio  :  \  It  is  amazing  what  ignorance 
of  certain  points  one  sometimes  finds  in  men  of 
eminence  i'1  though,  from  want  of  knowing  the 
sculptor,  a  visitor,  when  viewing  his  studio,  was 
heard  to  say  :  '  What  a  mind  the  man  must  have 
from  whom  all  these  emanated!'  Banks,  in  his  tale 
of  i  Every  Man  in  his  Way,'  commences  with  : 

'  One  art,  philosophers  maintain, 
Is  full  sufficient  for  one  brain  ; 
And  He  who  made  us  men,  design'd 
For  such  a  science  such  a  mind.' 

Defective  as  he  was  in  many  particulars,  Not 
lekens'  fame  for  bust  -  making  will  never  be 
diminished  ;  and  I  would  have  this  truth  '  written 
as  with  a  sunbeam.'  Possessed  of  such  distin- 
guished talent,  he  now  became  extremely  popular, 
though  he  never  sought  employment ;  and  perhaps 
no  man  had  less  intrigue  : 

1  As  spiders  never  seek  the  fly, 
But  leave  him  of  himself,  t'  apply.' 

Most  of  his  sitters  were  exceedingly  amused  with 
the  oddity  of  his  manner,  particularly  fine  women, 
who  were  often  gratified  by  being  considered  hand- 
some by  the  sculptor,  though  his  admiration  was 
expressed  in  the  plainest  language. 

I  remember  his  once  requesting  a  lady  who 
squinted  dreadfully  to  '  look  a  little  the  other  way, 
for  then,'  said  he,  '  I  shall  get  rid  of  the  shyness 
in  the  cast  of  your  eye  ;'  and  to  another  lady  of 

1  Dr.  Johnson,  upon  hearing  the  name  of  an  eminent  sculptor 
mentioned,  observed,  '  Well,  sir,  I  think  my  friend  Joe  Nollekens  can 
chop  out  a  head  with  any  of  them.' — Smith. 


CONVERSATION  73 


the  highest  rank,  who  had  forgotten  her  position, 
and  was  looking  down  upon  him,  he  cried  :  ;  Don't 
look  so  scorny ;  you'll  spoil  my  busto  ;  and  you're 
a  very  fine  woman  ;  I  think  it  will  be  one  of  my 
best  bnstos.'  I  heard  him  ask  the  daughter  of 
Lord  Yarborough,  in  the  presence  of  her  husband, 
to  prove  to  her  that  he  had  not  forgotten  all  his 
Italian,  if  she  did  not  recollect  his  dancing  her 
upon  his  knee  when  she  was  a  bambina.  He  was 
very  fond  of  speaking  Italian,  though  I  have  been 
told  it  was  exceedingly  bad  ;  and  he  would  often 
attempt  it  even  in  the  presence  of  the  Royal  Family, 
who  good-temperedly  smiled  at  his  whimsicalities. 

Even  the  gravest  of  men,  the  Lord  Chancellor 
Bathurst,1  when  sitting  to  him  for  his  bust  for  the 
Chancery  Court,  in  his  large  wig,  condescendingly 
endured  the  following  collection  of  nonsense,  in 
which  at  last  his  lordship  was  obliged  to  join. 
Nollekens :  4  Ah,  there  goes  the  bell  tolling  !  No, 
it's  only  my  clock  on  the  stairs.  When  I  was  a 
boy,  you  would  have  liked  to  have  seen  me  toll 
the  bell  ;  it's  no  very  easy  thing,  I  can  tell  you — 
look  a  little  that  way  ! — you  must  toll,  that  is  to 
say,  I  did,  one  hour  for  a  man,  three  times  three  ; 
and  three  times  two  for  a  woman.  Now,  your 
lordship  must  mind,  there's  a  moving-bell  and  a 
passing-bell  ;  these  the  Romans  always  attended 
to.'  c  You  mean  the  Roman  Catholics,  Mr.  Nolle- 
kens,' observed  his  lordship.  '  Yes,  my  lord,  they 
call  that  the    moving-bell,  which  goes  when  they 


1  Henry  Bathurst,  the  second  Earl  (1714-1794),  author  of  '  The 
Theory  of  Evidence.' — Ed. 


74  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 

move  a  body  out  of  one  parish  to  the  next,  or  so 
on.  The  passing-bell  is  when  you  are  dying,  and 
going  from  this  world  to  another  place.'  '  Ay,  Mr. 
Nollekens,'  observed  his  lordship,  \  there  is  a 
curious  little  book,  published  in  1671,  I  think  by 
Richard  Duckworth,  upon  the  art  of  ringing, 
entitled  "  Tintannologia." 

But  simple  and  half-witted  as  this  artist  certainly 
was,  yet  he  always  knew  how  to  take  care  of  what 
is  called  the  main  chance,  as  will  be  proved  by  the 
following  anecdote  : 

A  lady  in  weeds  for  her  dear  husband,  drooping 
low  like  the  willow,  visited  the  sculptor,  and  assured 
him  that  she  did  not  care  what  money  was  ex- 
pended on  a  monument  to  the  memory  of  her 
beloved  :  '  Do  what  you  please,  but  do  it  directly,' 
were  her  orders.  Industry  was  a  principle  riveted 
in  Nollekens'  constitution  ;  he  rose  with  the  lark, 
and  in  a  short  time  finished  the  model,  strongly 
suspecting  she  might,  like  some  others  he  had  been 
employed  by,  change  her  mind. 

The  lady,  in  about  three  months,  made  her 
second  appearance,  in  which  more  courage  is 
generally  assumed,  and  was  accosted  by  him,  before 
she  alighted,  with  '  Poor  soul  !  I  thought  you'd 
come  ;'  but  her  tripping  down  with  a  'light  fantastic 
toe,'  and  the  snorting  of  her  horses,  which  had 
been  hard  driven,  evinced  a  total  change  in  her 
inclination,  and  he  was  now  saluted  with  :  '  How 
do  you  do,  Nollekens.  Well,  you  have  not  com- 
menced the  model  ?'  '  Yes,  but  I  have,  though,' 
was   the  reply.      The  Lady :  c  Have  you,  indeed  ? 


ECCENTRIC  HABITS  75 

These,  my  good  friend,  I  own,'  throwing  herself 
into  a  chair,  '  are  early  days  ;  but  since  I  saw  you, 
an  old  Roman  acquaintance  of  yours  has  made  me 
an  offer,  and  I  don't  know  how  he  would  like  to 
see  in  our  church  a  monument  of  such  expense  to 
my  late  husband  ;  indeed,  perhaps,  after  all,  upon 
second  thoughts,  it  would  be  considered  quite 
enough  if  I  got  our  mason  to  put  up  a  mural 
inscription,  and  that,  you  know,  he  can  cut  very 
neatly.'  '  My  charge,'  interrupted  the  artist,  c  for 
my  model  will  be  one  hundred  guineas,'  which 
she  declared  to  be  '  enormous.'  However,  she 
would  pay  it  and  c  have  done  with  him.' 

His  singular  and  parsimonious  habits  were  most 
observable  in  his  domestic  life.  Coals  were  articles 
of  great  consideration  with  Mr.  Nollekens,  and 
these  he  so  rigidly  economized  that  they  were 
always  sent  early,  before  his  men  came  to  work,  in 
order  that  he  might  have  leisure  time  for  counting 
the  sacks,  and  disposing  of  the  large  coals  in  what 
was  originally  designed  by  the  builder  of  his  house 
for  a  wine-cellar,  so  that  he  might  lock  them  up  for 
parlour  use.  Candles  were  never  lighted  at  the 
commencement  of  the  evening,  and  whenever  they 
heard  a  knock  at  the  door,  they  would  wait  until 
they  heard  a  second  rap,  lest  the  first  should  have 
been  a  runaway,  and  their  candle  wasted.  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Nollekens  used  a  flat  candlestick  when  there 
was  anything  to  be  done  ;  and  I  have  been  assured 
that  a  pair  of  moulds,  by  being  well  nursed,  and 
put  out  when  company  went  away,  once  lasted 
them  a  whole  year  ! 


76  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


It  happened  one  morning  that  poor  old  Daphne, 
the  large  yard  dog,  a  constant  market-companion 
of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  barked  incessantly,  until  Mr. 
Nollekens,  who  was  then  taking  in  the  milk,  which 
was  his  constant  practice,  could  go  to  the  gate, 
where  he  was  addressed  by  a  raw-boned  man  full 
six  feet  in  height,  who  said  he  was  a  cutter  of 
funeral  inscriptions,  come  from  the  city  of  Norwich, 
and  would  be  glad  of  a  job.  At  this  time  the 
Literary  Club,  founded  by  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds, 
which  met  at  the  St.  Luke's  Head,  in  Gerrard 
Street,  had  signed  a  round-robin,  addressed  to 
Dr.  Johnson,  requesting  him  to  alter  into  English 
the  inscription  for  Dr.  Goldsmith's  monument,  at 
that  time  executing  by  Mr.  Nollekens,  who  promised 
the  man  at  the  gate  the  cutting  of  it  as  soon  as  it 
was  sent  back  ;  and  this  I  saw  him  execute  under  a 
shed  in  the  yard  near  the  dog,  who  constantly  eyed 
his  movements.  Trifling  as  the  incident  may  at 
first  appear,  this  person  became  a  valuable  assistant 
to  his  new  master,  under  whom  he  made  what  is 
called  a  very  pretty  fortune.  His  name  was 
William  Arminger,  and  he  carved  many  of  Mr. 
Nollekens'  best  busts  ;  but  farther  particulars  of 
him  will  be  given  in  a  future  page. 

The  monument  to  Dr.  Goldsmith  was  put  up 
in  Poets'  Corner,  Westminster  Abbev,  over  the 
entrance  to  the  Chapel  of  St.  Blaize,  which  has 
long  been  used  as  a  vestry  to  the  edifice. 


[77] 


CHAPTER  III. 

Friends  of  Mrs.  Nollekens — G.  M.  Moser  and  his  daughter  Mary — 
Her  letters,  and  one  from  Fuseli  in  reply — Angelica  Kauffmann  and 
her  marriage— Mrs.  Carter — Old  houses  on  Hampstead  Heath — 
G\  Steevens  and  his  portraits — Nollekens'  bust  of  George  III. — 
Parsimonious  management  of  Nollekens  when  a  bachelor — Personal 
appearance  of  him  and  his  wife — Economy  of  Mrs.  Nollekens — The 
sculptor's  figure  and  dress — White's  Coffee-house,  and  the  gamesters' 
address  to  the  King. 

Mrs.  Nollekens  was  honoured  with  the  friendship 
of  three  highly  celebrated  ladies — Miss  Moser,1 
K.A.,  the  famous  painter  of  flowers,  afterwards 
Mrs.  Lloyd  ;  Mrs.  Angelica  Kauffmann,  R.A., 
whose  works  are  too  well  known  to  need  any 
encomiums  from  me,  both  of  whom  were  chosen 
members  of  the  Royal  Academy  upon  its'  establish- 
ment ;  and  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Carter,2  the  well-known 
translator  of  Epictetus.  Of  the  two  former 
characters  I  shall  now  give  a  few  anecdotes,  which, 
from  their  being  uncommon,  at  this  distance  of 
time  may  prove  rather  interesting. 

Miss   Mary  Moser  was  the  daughter  of  George 
Michael   Moser,  a   truly  worthy  and   clever  man. 

1  Mary  Moser  lived  until  1819.     Her  friend  and  rival,  Angelica 
Kauffmann,  died  in  1807.— Ed. 

2  This  lady,  born  in  1717,  died  in  1806.     Her  famous  translation  of 
Epictetus  was  published  in  1758.— Ed. 


78  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

He  was  originally  a  chaser  ;  but  when  that  mode 
of  adorning  plate,  cane-heads,  and  watch-cases 
became  unfashionable,  he,  by  the  advice  of  his 
friend,  Mr.  Thomas  Grignon,  the  celebrated  watch- 
maker, applied  himself  to  enamelling  watch-trinkets, 
necklaces,  bracelets,  etc.,  from  which  occupation 
he  became  an  excellent  enameller  of  larger  and 
more  eminent  works.  He  drew  remarkably  well, 
and  was  successively  at  the  head  of  several  drawing 
schools,  until  at  last  he  was  elected  Keeper  of  the 
Royal  Academy  on  its  foundation,  which  situation 
he  filled  some  considerable  time  with  honour  to 
himself  and  his  brother  Academicians.  Moser  died 
at  his  apartments  in  Somerset  House  on  Friday, 
January  24,  1783,  aged  seventy-eight,  and  was 
buried  in  the  churchyard  of  St.  Paul,  Covent 
Garden. 

Mr.  Moser  orminallv  lived  in  Craven  Buildings. 
Drury  Lane — a  street  at  the  south  end  of  the  lane, 
which  was  built  upon  part  of  the  premises  of 
Craven  House  in  the  year  1723,  as  appears  by  an 
inscribed  stone  let  into  the  north-west  corner  house 
of  the  street,  at  the  bottom  of  which,  against  the 
wall,  was  a  large  equestrian  portrait  of  William 
Lord  Craven,  painted  by  Paul  Van  Somer  the 
younger,  for  there  were  two  painters  of  that  name. 
This  picture,  which  is  now  destroyed,  I  have  en- 
graven in  my  c  Antiquities  of  London.' 

Miss  Moser,  though  somewhat  of  a  precise  woman, 
was  at  times  a  most  cheerful  companion.  My  father 
knew  her  well,  and  was  often  delighted  by  hearing 
her  relate  the  passing  events  of  the  day,  specimens 


MARY  NOSER  79 


of  which  I  now  present  to  the  reader,  in  two  letters 
addressed  to  her  friend  Mrs.  Lloyd,  the  wife  of  the 
gentleman  whom  she  afterwards  married,  with  the 
loan  of  which  entertaining  epistles  I  was  favoured 
by  Mrs.  Nichols,  who  was  for  many  years  the 
faithful  companion  of  the  writer : 

'  May  8. 

'  My  dear  Friend, 

*  Come  to  London  and  admire  our  plumes.  We  sweep  the  sky. 
A  duchess  wears  six  feathers,  a  lady  four,  and  every  milkmaid  one  at 
each  corner  of  her  cap.  Your  mamma  desired  me  to  inquire  the  name 
of  something  she  had  seen  in  the  windows  in  Tavistock  Street.  It 
seems  she  was  afraid  to  ask ;  but  /  took  courage,  and  they  told  me 
they  were  rattlesnake  tippets.  However,  notwithstanding  their 
frightful  name,  they  are  not  very  much  unlike  a  beaufong,  only  the 
quills  are  made  stiff  and  springy  in  the  starching.  Fashion  is  grown 
a  monster.  Pray  tell  your  operator  that  your  hair  must  measure 
just  three-quarters  of  a  yard  from  the  extremity  of  one  wing  to  the 
other.  I  should  not  have  said  so  much  about  fashions,  but  I  suppose 
it  makes  part  of  the  conversation  of  country  ladies.  I  hope  my  advice 
will  not  be  stale.     French  trimming  is  quite  the  bon-ton. 

'N.B. — The  Queen  and  her  ladies  never  wear  feathers.  They  say 
here  that  the  minority  ladies  are  distinguished  from  the  courtiers  by 
their  plumes.  Mrs.  Sheriff  brought  a  terrible  story  of  a  trance,  which 
I  suppose  your  mamma  has  told  you  already  ;  but  I  have  since  in- 
quired into  the  merits  of  the  case,  and  have  been  assured  by  some  of 
the  lady's  relations,  who  are  likewise  cousins  of  mine  by  marriage,  that 
the  story  is  fabulous,  and  they  fancy  it  was  fabricated  to  amuse  a 
good  old  aunt  who  delights  in  the  marvellous.  Is  there  no  ghostly 
story  propagated  at  Carnarvon  that  would  petrify  one's  friends  ?  For 
Heaven's  sake  invent  me  some  !  Let  them  be  very  wonderful  indeed, 
that  I  may  make  a  figure  among  the  old  ladies.  I  have  found  very 
good  effects  from  telling  a  terrific  story  when  I  have  held  a  doubtful, 
low  hand  ;  pray  keep  this  secret.  I  do  not  know  one  gossiping 
anecdote,  or  it  should  be  at  your  service.  My  father  and  mother  join 
in  compliments  to  you  and  Captain  Lloyd,  and 
'  I  remain,  to  all  perpetuity, 

i  Your  sincere  friend  and  humble  servant, 

'Mary  Moser.' 


8o  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

1  Somerset  House,  Jan.  9. 
'My  dear  Friend, 

1  Your  " Palace  of  Silence"  has  engrossed  all  my  thoughts  for 
these  last  six  weeks  ;  I  dream  of  it,  and  cry  "  Silence  !"  in  my  sleep. 
If  your  printer  should  not  have  mercy  on  me,  and  bring  it  out  shortly, 
I  shall  certainly  die  with  impatience. 

4  The  renewal  of  the  year  gives  me  an  opportunity  of  wishing  you 
in  words  what  I  always  wish  you  in  thought — many,  many  happy 
years.  "  May  you  live  as  long  as  you  deserve  to  live  !"  says  Lord 
Chesterfield  to  his  son.  Give  me  leave  to  conclude  my  wish  in  the 
same  manner  ;  because,  if  my  wish  succeed,  you  will  live  for  ever. 
Pray,  if  you  have  read  Lord  Chesterfield's  letters,  give  me  your 
opinion  of  them,  and  what  you  think  of  his  lordship.  For  my  part,  I 
admire  wit  and  adore  good  manners,  but  at  the  same  time  I  should 
detest  Lord  Chesterfield,  were  he  alive,  young,  and  handsome,  and  my 
lover,  if  I  supposed,  as  I  do  now,  his  wit  was  the  result  of  thought, 
and  that  he  had  been  practising  the  graces  in  the  looking-glass.  I 
cannot  help  smiling  at  the  fine  compliments  he  desires  his  son  to  make 
to  the  Duke  of  Newcastle,  and  the  delicate  turn  of  his  epistle  to 
Voltaire.  Witty  sayings  made  yesterday,  and  compliments  manu- 
factured at  leisure,  I  hate  ;  so  I  will  not  allow  my  Lord  Chesterfield 
to  have  been  a  wit,  unless  you  speak  in  his  defence,  which  I  think  you 
will  not  do,  because  he  has  said  the  best  of  us  are  little  better  than 
things  in  leading-strings  and  forehead  cloths.  However,  as  I  have 
heard  that  it  is  generous  to  acknowledge  the  merit  of  those  we  do  not 
love,  I  will  declare,  if  all  the  good  things  in  Lord  Chesterfield's  work 
were  compiled  in  one  volume,  independent  of  his  adoration  of  the 
Graces,  it  would  be  a  most  excellent  little  book. 

'I  shall  have  the  pleasure  of  seeing  your  mamma  this  afternoon  at 
Mrs.  Toussaint's  ;  so  adieu,  my  dear  friend,  and  believe  me, 
1  Sincerely,  with  all  love, 

'  Your  humble,  humble  servant, 

'Mary  Moser. 

'  To  Mrs.  Lloyd.5 

Mrs.  Nichols  lias  also  indulged  me  with  the 
loan  of  two  other  letters,  one  of  which  is  warmly 
addressed  by  Miss  Moser  to  Fuseli  when  at  Rome  ;x 

1  Fuseli  left  England  in  December,  1769,  and  arrived  at  Kome  in 
January,  1770.  In  September,  1778,  he  left  Rome  for  Switzerland, 
where  he  continued  till  the  middle  of  1779,  when  he  returned  to 
England. — Smith. 


MARY  MOSER 


the  other  is  Fuseli's  answer,  and  is  certainly  coldly 
written.  However,  with  these  epistles  the  reader 
will  be  highly  pleased,  as  they  contain  some  truly 
interesting  particulars  respecting  the  arts.  I  should 
have  premised  that  Miss  Moser  was  glancing  at 
Fuseli,  but  his  heart  unfortunately  had  already  been 
deeply  pierced  by  Angelica  Kauffmann  : 

'If  you  have  not  forgotten  at  Rome  those  friends  whom  yon 
remembered  at  Florence,  write  to  me  from  that  nursery  of  arts  and 
raree-show  of  the  world,  which  nourishes  in  ruins  ;  tell  me  of  pictures, 
palaces,  people,  lakes,  woods,  and  rivers  ;  say  if  Old  Tiber  droops  with 
age,  or  whether  his  waters  flow  as  clear,  his  rushes  grow  as  green,  and 
his  swans  look  as  white  as  those  of  Father  Thames  ;  or  write  me  your 
own  thoughts  and  reflections,  which  will  be  more  acceptable  than 
any  description  of  anything  Greece  and  Eome  have  done  these  two 
thousand  years. 

1 1  suppose  there  has  been  a  million  of  letters  sent  to  Italy  with  an 
account  of  our  Exhibition,  so  it  will  be  only  telling  you  what  you 
know  already  to  say  that  Reynolds  was  like  himself  in  pictures  which 
you  have  seen  ;  Gainsborough  beyond  himself  in  a  portrait  of  a 
gentleman  in  a  Vandyke  habit  ;  and  Zoffany  superior  to  everybody  in 
a  portrait  of  Garrick  in  the  character  of  Abel  Drugger,  with  two 
other  figures,  Subtle  and  Face.  Sir  Joshua  agreed  to  give  an  hundred 
guineas  for  the  picture.  Lord  Carlisle  half  an  hour  after  offered 
Reynolds  twenty  to  part  with  it,  which  the  knight  generously  refused, 
resigned  his  intended  purchase  to  the  lord,  and  the  emolument  to  his 
brother  artist.  (He  is  a  gentleman  !)  Angelica  made  a  very  great 
addition  to  the  show,  and  Mr.  Hamilton's  picture  of  Briseis  parting 
from  Achilles  was  very  much  admired  ;  the  Briseis  in  taste,  a  la 
antique,  elegant  and  simple.  Coates,  Dance,  Wilson,  etc.,  as  usual. 
Mr.  West  had  no  large  picture  finished.  You  will  doubtless  imagine 
that  I  derived  my  epistolary  genius  from  my  nurse  ;  but  when  you 
are  tired  of  my  gossiping  you  may  burn  the  letter,  so  I  shall  go  on. 
Some  of  the  literati  of  the  Royal  Academy  were  very  much  dis- 
appointed, as  they  could  not  obtain  diplomas  ;  but  the  Secretary,  who 
is  above  trifles,  has  since  made  a  very  flattering  compliment  to  the 
Academy  in  the  preface  to  the  "  Travels."  The  Professor  of  History 
is  comforted  by  the  success  of  his  "  Deserted  Village,"  which  is  a  very 
pretty  poem,  and  has  lately  put  himself  under  the  conduct  of  Mrs. 
Hornick  and   her  fair  daughters,  and   is  gone  to  France ;  and  Dr. 


82  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Johnson  sips  his  tea,  and  cares  not  for  the  vanity  of  the  world.  Sir 
Joshua  a  few  days  ago  entertained  the  Council  and  visitors  with 
callipash  and  callipee,  except  poor  Coates,1  who  last  week  fell  a  sacrifice 
to  the  corroding  power  of  soap-lees,  which  he  hoped  would  have  cured 
him  of  the  stone.  Many  a  tear  will  drop  on  his  grave,  as  he  is  not 
more  lamented  as  an  artist  than  a  friend  to  the  distressed.  {Ma  poca 
polvere  sono  che  nulla  sente  /)  My  mamma  declares  that  you  are  an 
insufferable  creature,  and  that  she  speaks  as  good  English  as  your 
mother  did  High  German.  Mr.  Meyer  laughed  aloud  at  your  letter, 
and  desired  to  be  remembered.  My  father  and  his  daughter  long  to 
know  the  progress  you  will  make,  particularly 

'Mary  Moser, 

who  remains  sincerely  your  friend,  and  believes  you  will  exclaim  or 
mutter  to  yourself,  "  Why  did  she  send  this  d — d  nonsense  to  mef" 

1  Rome,  April  27,  1771. 
1  Madam, 

'I  am  inexcusable.  I  know  your  letter  by  heart,  and  have 
never  answered  it ;  but  I  am  often  so  very  unhappy  within  that  I  hold 
it  matter  of  remorse  to  distress  such  a  friend  as  Miss  Moser  with  my 
own  whimsical  miseries.  They  may  be  fancied  evils,  but  to  him  who 
has  fancy,  real  evils  are  unnecessary,  though  I  have  them  too.  All  I 
can  say  is  that  I  am  approaching  the  period  which  commonly  decides 
a  man's  life  with  regard  to  fame  or  infamy.  If  I  am  distracted  by  the 
thought,  those  who  have  passed  the  Rubicon  will  excuse  me,  and  you 
are  amongst  the  number. 

'  Mr.  Runciman,2  who  does  me  the  favour  to  carry  these  lines,  my 
friend,  and  in  my  opinion  the  best  painter  of  us  in  Rome,  has  desired 
me  to  introduce  him  to  your  family  ;  but  he  wants  no  other  intro- 
duction than  his  merit.  I  beg  my  warmest  compliments  to  papa  and 
mamma,  and  am  unaltered, 

*  Madam, 
'  Your  most  obliged  servant  and  friend, 

1  Fuseli. 
1  To  Miss  Moser, 
*  Craven  Buildings,  Drury  Lane.' 

1  Francis  Cotes  (1726-1770).  He  was  the  first  member  of  the 
Royal  Academy  to  die. — Ed. 

2  Alexander  Runciman,  the  Scotch  historical  painter.  He  was  in 
Rome  from  1766  to  1771.  He  died  in  1785,  in  his  fiftieth  year. 
—Ed. 


ANGELICA  KAUFFMANN  S3 


The  late  Queen  Charlotte,  whose  real  worth  as 
to  private  benevolence  was  not  known  until  after 
her  death,  took  particular  notice  of  Miss  Moser, 
and  for  a  considerable  time  employed  her  at  Frog- 
more  for  the  decoration  of  one  chamber,  which  her 
Majesty  commanded  to  be  called  Miss  Moser' s 
Room,  and  for  which  the  Queen  paid  upwards  of 
£900. 

It  having:  been  asserted  that  Angelica  Kauffmann 
studied  from  an  exposed  male  living  model,  which 
Mr.  Nollekens  said  he  believed,  I  was  determined 
to  gain  the  best  information  on  the  subject  by  going 
to  Mr.  Charles  Cranmer,  one  of  the  original  models 
of  the  Royal  Academy,  now  living,  in  his  eighty- 
second  year,  at  No.  13,  in  Regent  Street,  Vauxhall 
Bridge,  and  he  assured  me  that  he  did  frequently 
sit  before  Angelica  Kauffmann  at  her  house  on  the 
south  side  of  Golden  Square,  but  that  he  only 
exposed  his  arms,  shoulders,  and  legs,  and  that 
her  father,  who  was  also  an  artist  and  likewise 
an  exhibitor  at  the  Royal  Academy,  was  always 
present.  I  have  under  my  care,  as  Keeper  of  the 
Prints  and  Drawings  in  the  British  Museum,  a  most 
spirited  study  of  hers,  dated  1771,  of  a  male 
Academy  model,  recumbent  and  half  draped  ;  it  is 
in  black  and  white  chalk,  upon  brown  paper,  and  is 
in  the  splendid  collection  left  to  the  Museum  by  the 
late  Richard  Payne  Knight,  Esq.,  a  trustee  of  that 
magnificent  establishment,  which  will  in  a  few  years 
be  the  admiration  of  our  own  country  and  the  envy 
of  all  the  world. 


84  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Angelica,  before  she  married  Mr.  Zucchi,1  the 
artist,  was  most  artfully  deceived  by  a  discarded 
servant  of  Count  Horn,  who  had  imposed  himself 
upon  her  smiles  with  the  title  of  his  late  master  ; 
and  being  a  very  fine,  handsome  fellow,  she  was 
determined  to  show  her  friends,  with  whom  she 
had  flirted,  that  she  had  at  last  made  a  good  hit, 
and  therefore,  without  the  least  hesitation,  imme- 
diately gave  her  hand  to  the  impostor.  The  next 
time  Angelica  attended  at  Buckingham  House  upon 
the  Queen,  who  was  pleased  by  seeing  her  paint, 
she  communicated  her  marriage  to  her  Majesty, 
upon  which  she  received  the  most  condescending 
congratulations,  with  an  invitation  to  her  husband 
to  come  to  Court  ;  who,  however,  was  cunningly 
determined  to  keep  himself  within  the  house,  from 
the  sight  of  everyone,  until  his  baggage  had  arrived, 
which  he  expected  every  day.  At  last  Count  Horn 
himself  came  to  England,  and,  when  at  the  levee, 
was  much  surprised  by  being  complimented  upon 
his  marriage.  Angelica,  who  soon  received  the 
mortifying  information  from  the  Queen,  was  for  a 
time  inconsolable  ;  but  at  last  her  friends  prevailed 
upon  the  fortune-hunter  to  leave  England  upon  a 
pension,  and  Angelica,  who  resumed  the  name  of 
Kauffmann,  which  she  retained  till  her  death,  was 
fortunately  never  troubled  with  him  afterwards. 

Mrs.  Carter,  of  whom  Mrs.  Nollekens  was  in 
possession  of  a  portrait,  most  exquisitely  engraven 

1  Antonio  Zucchi,  the  Venetian  decorator  (1726-1795),  came  to- 
England  early  in  life,  was  elected  an  A.R.A.  in  1770,  and  married 
Angelica  in  1781.— Ed. 


CHEERES  LEADEN  FIGURES  85 

by  Hayward,  from  a  picture  by  Lawrence,  would 
often  complain  of  her  c  indefatigable  headache.'1 
She  was  a  truly  sincere  woman,  and  will  be  intro- 
duced in  a  future  page. 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Noliekens  took  me  one  Sunday 
morning  with  them  in  a  glass  coach  to  pass  a  day 
with  their  friend  Mrs.  Haycock,  a  very  aged  lady 
who  resided  near  Hampstead  Heath.  She  was  quite 
of  the  old  school  in  her  dress,  and  so  indeed  was 
everything  in  and  about  her  house.  Her  evergreens 
were  cut  into  the  shapes  of  various  birds  ;  and 
Cheere's2  leaden  painted  figures  of  a  shepherd  and 
shepherdess  were  objects  of  as  much  admiration 
with  her  neighbours  as  they  were  with  my  Lord 
Ogleby,  who  thus  accosts  his  friend  in  the  second 
scene  of  the  '  Clandestine  Marriage  ' : 

'  Great  improvements,  indeed,  Mr.  Stirling !  wonderful  improve- 
ments !  The  four  seasons  in  lead,  the  flying  Mercury,  and  the  basin 
with  Neptune  in  the  middle  are  in  the  very  extreme  of  fine  taste. 
You  have  as  many  rich  figures  as  the  man  at  Hyde  Park  Corner.' 

The  line  row  of  elms,  which  is  now  open  upon 
the  left  hand  of  the  green  opposite  to  a  garden 
wall,  was,  at  the  time  we  made  the  visit,  within 
Mrs.  Haycock's  grounds,  which  were  surrounded 
by  a  primly-cut  holly-edge.  After  we  had  dined 
with  this  lady,  who  had  lived  several  years  beyond 
eighty,  at  which  period  she  had  received  the  small - 

1  Miss  Elizabeth  Carters  '  indefatigable  headache '  was  the  result  of 
excessive  attention  to  Greek  and  Latin  studies  in  her  early  youth. 
She  was  a  very  fine  linguist. — Ed. 

2  Sir  Henry  Cheere,  the  statuary  (?  1700-1781),  was  celebrated  for 
his  leaden  figures  for  garden  decoration.  His  shop  was  in  Picca- 
dilly.—Ed. 


86  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

pox,  Mrs.  Nollekens  expressed  a  wish  to  view  the 
grounds  of  her  opposite  neighbour,  George  Steevens,1 
Esq.,  better  known  under  the  appellation  of  c  Shake- 
speare Steevens ' ;  and  she  was  more  particularly 
anxious  to  see  this  spot,  as  she  had  often  heard  her 
father  speak  of  its  notoriety.  It  having  been,  too, 
a  fashionable  place  of  resort  for  the  Londoners, 
when  it  was  the  Upper  Flask  Tavern,  and  Richard- 
son having  noticed  it  as  the  place  where  his  Clarissa 
had  fled  to  from  Lovelace,  the  public  at  that  time 
was  generally  talking  about  it. 

Mr.  Steevens  ordered  his  gardener  to  show  the 
grounds,  which  were  beautiful  beyond  description. 

I  received  no  small  pleasure  last  summer,  when — 
Shepherd,  Esq.,  the  present  possessor,  politely  gave 
me  permission  to  revisit  them,  to  find  this  highly 
enviable  spot  nearly  in  the  same  state  in  which  it 
was  in  my  youthful  days. 

Steevens  early  in  life  was  rather  conceited  of  his 
person,  and  had  a  miniature  of  himself  beautifully 
painted  by  the  celebrated  Meyer,2  the  enameller 
and  Royal  Academician.  He  also  stood,  being  fond 
of  private  theatricals,  in  which  he  often  took  a 
part,  for  a  whole-length  portrait  in  oil  in  the 
character  of  Barbarossa.  Zoffany  likewise  painted 
a  picture  of  him  in  oil,  with  a  favourite  little  dog, 
which  has  been  engraven  for  Boydell  for  his  edition 
of   Shakespeare.      Fond  as  he  was  of   having  his 

1  The  Shakespearian  annotator  (1736-1800).— Ed. 

2  Jeremiah  Meyer,  a  native  of  Wirtemberg,  came  to  England  in 
1749,  and  was  a  foundation  member  of  the  Royal  Academy.  He  died 
in  1789.— Ed. 


GEORGE  STE EVENS  87 

portrait  taken  in  early  life,  in  his  latter  days  lie  not 
only  refused  to  sit,  but  actually  took  the  greatest 
pains  to  destroy  every  resemblance  of  his  features, 
and  never  suffered  himself  to  remain  in  the  company 
of  an  artist  for  any  length  of  time,  lest  he  should 
steal  his  likeness.  Notwithstanding  these  precau- 
tions, however,  he  was  seriously  annoyed  by  re- 
ceiving an  impression  of  an  etching  of  his  face, 
though  not  a  very  good  likeness,  taken  by  stealth 
by  Sayer,1  the  caricaturist,  at  which  liberty  Steevens 
was  so  highly  exasperated  that  he  threatened  '  to 
cane  the  fellow ' — a  mode  of  chastisement  which, 
with  a  raised  arm  and  a  clenched  fist,  he  often  de- 
clared he  would  inflict  upon  most  of  those  persons 
who  offended  him.  Steevens,  who  certainly  had 
remarkably  handsome  legs,  which  he  generally 
covered  with  white  cotton  stockings,  would  fre- 
quently pique  himself  upon  having  walked  from 
his  house  at  Hampstead,  half  over  London  and 
back,  without  receiving  a  speck  of  dirt  upon 
them. 

Mrs.  Swan,  an  aged  woman,  who  lets  ready- 
furnished  lodgings  in  Hampstead,  and  who  married 
Steevens'  gardener,  assured  me  that  no  creature  on 
earth  could  be  more  afraid  of  death  than  Steevens  ; 
that  on  the  day  of  his  decease  he  came  into  the 
kitchen,  where  she  and  her  husband  were  sitting  at 
dinner,  snatched  at  their  pudding,  which  he  ate 
most  voraciously,  at  the   same   time    defying   the 

1  James  Sayer,  a  Yarmouth  man,  who  produced  a  long  series  of 
coarse  but  effective  political  caricatures.  Born  in  1748,  he  died  in 
1823.— Ed. 


88  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

grinning  monster  in  the  most  terrific  language. 
However,  lie  died,  and  Flaxman  lias  placed  his 
effigy  on  his  monument  in  white  marble,  placidly 
seated  contemplating  a  bust  o£  Shakespeare,  which 
is  erected  in  the  north  chancel  of  the  East  India 
Company's  Chapel  in  Poplar. 

I  once  heard  Mr.  Nollekens  relate  an  anecdote  in 
the  presence  of  Mr.  Richard  Dalton,1  then  librarian 
to  King  George  III.,  which  will  show  how  well  his 
Majesty  must  have  been  acquainted  with  even  the 
religious  persuasions  as  well  as  the  faces  and  family 
connections  of  his  subjects. 

'  When  I  was  modelling  the  King's  busto,'  ob- 
served Mr.  Nollekens,  '  I  was  commanded  to  go  to 
receive  the  King  at  Buckingham  House  at  seven 
o'clock  in  the  morning,  for  that  was  the  time  his 
Majesty  shaved.  After  he  had  shaved  himself,  and 
before  he  had  put  on  his  stock,  I  modelled  my 
busto.  I  sot  him  down,  to  be  even  with  myself, 
and  the  King  seeing  me  go  about  him  and  about 
him,  said  to  me,  "  What  do  you  want  ?" — I  said, 
"  I  want  to  measure  vour  nose.  The  Queen  tells 
me  I  have  made  my  nose  too  broad." — "  Measure 
it,  then,"  said  the  King." ' — cAy,  my  good  friend,' 
observed  Dalton,  who  had  been  intimate  with  Nolle- 
kens during  their  stay  at  Rome,  '  I  have  heard  it 
often  mentioned  in  the  library  ;  and  it  has  also 
been  affirmed  that  you  pricked  the  King's  nose  with 
your  said  calipers.  I  will  tell  you  what  the  King 
said  of  you  when  you  did  not  attend  according  to 

1  A  brother  of   John   Dalton,  the   poetical   divine.     He  died  in 
1797.-ED. 


RELIGIOUS  OPINIONS  89 

command  one  morning  :  "  Noilekens  is  not  come  ;  I 
forgot,  it  is  a  saint's  clay,  and  he  is  a  Catholic." 

Although  it  is  true  tiiat  Noilekens  followed  the 
old  family  persuasion  of  his  father,  and  possibly 
he  might  at  that  time,  as  it  was  just  after  his  arrival 
from  Rome,  have  paid  more  attention  to  saints' 
days,  yet  I  am  quite  certain  that  during  his  latter 
years  he  cared  very  little  for  the  Catholic  religion, 
nor,  indeed,  for  any  other.  As  for  Mrs.  Noilekens, 
though  she  pretended  to  be  a  stanch  friend  to  the 
National  Protestant  Church,  yet  she  never  con- 
tributed much  to  its  ^support  ;  for  she  certainly 
never  was  known  to  indulge  in  the  expense  of  a 
pew,  or  even  in  a  single  seat.  She  generally  con- 
trived, by  standing  near  the  pew  of  some  one  of 
her  tenants,  to  catch  an  eye  of  observation,  when 
she  was  sure  of  being  accommodated  with  a  seat, 
not  only  in  the  church,  but  very  often  in  a  carriage 
home  ;  and  this  latter  attention  often  afforded  her 
an  opportunity  of  accepting  an  invitation  to  a  card- 
party,  or  a  seat  in  a  box  at  the  opera,  of  which 
entertainment  she  always  declared  herself  to  be 
excessively  fond. 

The  following  anecdote  is  current,  but  on  what 
authority  it  rests  I  know  not  ;  alloAving  the  story 
to  be  true,  it  could  come  only  from  an  attendant  on 
the  King — certainly  not  from  his  Majesty,  nor  from 
Noilekens  ;  however,  I  could  name  half  a  dozen 
persons  who  continue  to  relate  it. 

The  story  runs  thus  :  When  Mr.  Noilekens 
attended  the  King  the  following  day  to  receive  his 
Majesty's  commands  as  to  the  time  for  the  next 


9o  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

sitting,  as  he  approached  the  royal  presence,  instead 
of  making  an  apology  on  the  saint's  account,  he 
merelv  wished  to  know  when  he  mi^ht  be  allowed 
to  go  on  with  his  busto.  The  King,  however, 
with  his  usual  indulgence  to  persons  as  ignorant 
as  Nollekens  was  of  the  common  marks  of  respect, 
observed,  '  So,  Nollekens,  where  were  you  vester- 
day  ?' 

Nollekens:  'Why,  as  it  was  a  saint's  day,  I 
thought  you  would  not  have  me  ;  so  I  went  to  see 
the  beasts  fed  in  the  Tower.' 

The  King :  '  Why  did  you  not  go  to  Duke 
Street  ?' 

Nollekens ;  '  Well,  I  went  to  the  Tower  ;  and  do 
you  know,  they  have  got  two  such  lions  there  ! 
and  the  biggest  did  roar  so ;  my  heart  !  how  he  did 
roar  !'  And  then  he  mimicked  the  roaring  of  the 
lion,  so  loud  and  so  close  to  the  King's  ear  that  his 
Majesty  moved  to  a  considerable  distance  to  escape 
the  imitation,  without  saying,  like  Bottom  in  the 
comedy : 

■  Let  him  roar  again,  let  him  roar  again.' 

A  modeller  keeps  his  clay  moist  by  spirting  water 
over  it ;  and  this  he  does  by  standing  at  a  little 
distance  with  his  mouth  filled  with  water,  which  he 
spirts  upon  it,  so  that  the  water  is  sent  into  all  the 
recesses  of  his  model  before  he  covers  it  up  ;  this, 
it  is  said,  Nollekens  did  in  the  King's  presence, 
without  declaring  what  he  was  about  to  do.  How- 
ever,  it  was  not   the   case   with   Mr.  Bacon,1  the 

1  John  Bacon,  R.A.  (1740-1790).     See  prefatory  essay.— En. 


MODE  OF  LIFE 


sculptor,  who  had  provided  a  long  silver  syringe 
for  that  purpose  before  he  attended  the  King,  with 
which  he  could  easily  throw  the  water  into  the 
recesses  of  the  model,  without  making  so  disagree- 
able a  noise  in  his  Majesty's  presence.  With  the 
drapery  of  this  bust  of  the  King  Nollekens  had 
more  anxiety  and  trouble  than  with  any  of  his 
other  productions  ;  he  assured  Mr.  Joseph,1  the 
Associate  of  the  Royal  Academy,  that  after  throw- 
ing the  cloth  once  or  twice  every  day  for  nearly  a 
fortnight,  it  came  excellently  well,  by  mere  chance, 
from  the  following  circumstance.  Just  as  he  was 
about  to  make  another  trial  with  his  drapery,  his 
servant  came  to  him  for  money  for  butter ;  he 
threw  the  cloth  carelessly  over  the  shoulders  of  his 
lay-man  in  order  to  give  her  the  money,  when  he 
was  forciblv  struck  with  the  beautiful  manner  in 
which  the  folds  had  fallen  ;  and  he  hastily  ex- 
claimed, pushing  her  away,  '  Go,  go,  get  the 
butter.'  And  he  has  frequently  been  heard  to  say 
that  that  drapery  was  by  far  the  best  he  ever  cast 
for  a  bust. 

The  reader  is  to  be  informed  that  wThen  Mr. 
Nollekens  was  engaged  upon  this  bust  of  our  late 
gracious  King,  Miss  Mary  Welch  was  not  in  posses- 
sion of  the  power  of  managing  his  domestic  con- 
cerns. He  was  then  a  single  man,  and  his  servant, 
for  at  that  time  he  kept  but  one,  always  applied  to 
him  for  money  to  purchase   every   description  of 

1  George  Francis  Joseph,  the  painter,  born  in  1764.  In  1813  he 
was  elected  A.R.A.,  but  was  never  promoted.  He  died  in  1846.  The 
sculptor  Samuel  Joseph  was  his  cousin. — Ed. 


92  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

article  fresJi,  as  it  was  wanted  for  the  approaching 
meal  ;  and  by  that  mode  of  living,  he  concluded,  as 
he  kept  his  servant  upon  board-wages,  he  was  not 
so  much  exposed  to  her  pilfering  inclinations,  par- 
ticularly as  she  was  entrusted  with  no  more  money 
than  would  enable  her  to  purchase  just  enough  for 
his  own  eating.  He  generally  contrived  to  get 
through  the  small  quantity  he  allowed  himself, 
never  thinking  of  keeping  any  portion  of  a  roll  or 
a  pat  of  butter  for  anyone  who  might  pop  in  at  his 
breakfasting-hour,  or  as  a  reserve  for  a  friend  as  a 
bever  before  dinner. 

I  have  frequently  heard  Miss  Moser  assure  my 
father  that,  whenever  she  carried  him  a  pot  of  jelly 
or  a  quince  marmalade,  she  always,  upon  opening 
his  closet,  found  the  last  presented  pot  entirely 
emptied,  so  fond  was  he  of  anything  given  to  him, 
particularly  when  he  had  a  sore  throat,  of  which  he 
frequently  complained  to  those  who  made  black- 
currant jelly. 

Before  the  commencement  of  some  other  anec- 
dotes, which  may  amuse  the  reader,  I  must  indulge 
in  a  comparison  betwixt  the  general  appearance  of 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nollekens,  certainly  not  cheek-by- 
jowl,  but  by  the  simile  of  placing  a  pair  of  com- 
passes and  a  short  pair  of  calipers  side  by  side  ; 
the  first  opened  at  ten  degrees,  or  perhaps  not  quite 
so  much,  the  latter  at  full  fifteen  ;  and  then,  I 
think,  Mrs.  Nollekens  will  stand  pardoned  for  con- 
tinuing to  call  her  husband  ;  Little  Nolly,'  which 
name,  by-the-by,  he  originally  received  from  her 
early  admirer  and  sincere  friend,  Dr.  Johnson,  who 


ECCENTRICITIES  93 

never  failed  to  visit  her,  for  the  last  three  years  of 
his  life,  at  least  three  times  a  month,  so  that  I  had 
frequent  opportunities  of  peeping  at  him.  In  the 
way  in  which  the  compasses  and  calipers  will 
appear,  when  opened  at  the  above  degrees,  so  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Nollekens'  figures  may  be  conceived— 
the  lady  with  legs  tall,  thin,  and  straight,  the 
gentleman  with  limbs  short  and  bowed;  thus  pro- 
portioned, they  would  slowly  move,  on  a  Sunday 
morning,  till  they  arrived  at  a  certain  corner  in 
Mortimer  Street,  where  they  then  parted,  the  one 
turning  to  the  right,  the  other  to  the  left  ;  he  to  the 
Roman  Catholic  Chapel,  and  she  to  the  Protestant 
Church. 

Sometimes  in  the  evening,  when  they  had  no 
engagements,  to  take  a  little  fresh  air,  and  to  avoid 
interlopers,  they  would,  after  putting  a  little  tea  and 
sugar,  a  French  roll,  or  a  couple  of  rusks  into  their 
pockets,  stray  to  Madam  Caria's,  a  Frenchwoman 
who  lived  near  the  end  of  Marylebone  Lane,  in 
what  were  at  that  time  called  the  French  Gardens, 
principally  tenanted  by  the  citizens,  where  persons 
were  accommodated  with  tea  equipage  and  hot 
water  at  a  penny  a  head.  Mrs.  Nollekens  made 
it  a  rule  to  allow  one  servant — as  they  kept  two — 
to  go  out  on  the  alternate  Sunday  ;  for  it  was  Mr. 
Nollekens'  opinion  that  if  they  were  never  per- 
mitted to  visit  the  Jew's  Harp,  Queen's  Head  and 
Artichoke,  or  Chalk  Farm,  they  never  would  wash 
their  selves. 

Had   the  facetious  Samuel  Foote  witnessed  the 
following  scene,  it  is  probable  he  would  have  given 


94  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

it  a  more  humorous  commemoration  ;  but  I  shall 
endeavour  to  narrate  it  in  the  manner  Mrs.  Bland, 
who  kept  a  turner's  shop,  used  to  tell  it  to   her 
customers.     Mrs.   Nollekens,   upon    opening    Mrs. 
Bland's  door,  declared  she  had  not   seen  her   for 
some  time,  though  they  lived  in  the  same  street, 
and  were  close  neighbours,  only  seven  doors  apart. 
Mrs.  Bland:  'No,  madam,  I  have  not  sold  you   a 
broom   for  these   five   years  !'      Mrs.    Nollekens  : 
4  Five  years  !  my  dear  Mrs.  Bland,  how  time  passes  ! 
though  you  don't  look  the  worse  for  wear,  my  good 
friend.'      Mrs.    Bland :     c  I    thank   you,    ma'am,    I 
have  had  my  share  of  troubles,  with  my  poor  dear 
husband  and  my  two  boys.'     Mrs.  Nollekens  :  '  Ah  ! 
so  we  all  have.     My  house  opposite  has  been  to  let 
a  good  while  now,  ever  since  the  General  left  it  ; 
is   it   not  a  pity  so  good   a  house  should  remain 
empty  ?     Indeed  it  must  be  a   great  loss  to  you, 
Mrs.  Bland,  for  I  understand  they  had  all  their 
turnery  of  you.'     Mrs.  Bland :  c  Yes  ;  and  what  is 
more,  they  always  gave  me  my   price,    and   paid 
punctually  !'     Mrs.  Nollekens :  '  I  will  now  put  it 
in  your  power  to  gain  a  customer.     Here  is  a  bill, 
Avhich  I  got  Little  Smith  '  (myself)  '  to  write  in  a 
large  hand  ;  allow  it  to  occupy  a  pane  of  your  shop- 
window,  and  as  there  is  more  sun  upon  this  side  of 
the  street,  the  white  paper  will  sooner  catch  the 
eye.'     Mrs.  Bland :  '  I  have  no  objection.'     ;  Well, 
then,'  rejoined  the  lady,   '  do  desire  your  girl   to 
clean  the  glass,  and  then  put  it  up  while  I  stay. 
Bless  me  !  I  totally  forgot  to  bring  wafers  ;  can 
you  oblige  me  with  one  ?'     Mrs.  Bland :  '  I   will 


PERSONAL  APPEARANCE     »  95 

see  ;  we  have  used  them  so  little  here  since  my 
poor  dear  husband  died.'  Mrs.  Nollekens ;  '  Pray 
don't  mention  the  loss  of  him  now  ;  we  should 
never  repine.  Bless  me  !  what  a  miserable  stock  ! 
Stay,  we  will  not  mind  the  colours,  we  shall  manage 
it.'  The  bill  being  stuck  up,  Mrs.  Nollekens  asked 
her  neighbour  what  was  the  price  of  a  good  mop. 
Mrs.  Bland,  after  taking  one  down,  and  striking  it 
on  the  floor  to  make  it  appear  bushy,  and  holding  it 
as  a  buffetier  would  his  halbert,  replied,  '  There, 
ma'am,  there's  a  mop — half  a  crown.'  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens :  '  What  !  half  a  crown  ?  My  good  woman, 
why,  I  only  gave  two  shillings  and  threepence  for 
the  last.'  '  Yes,  ma'am,'  observed  the  shopkeeper, 
'  but  that  was  ten  years  ago.'  Mrs.  Nollekens  f 
4  Come,  come,  Mrs.  Bland,  don't  be  rude  ;  /  know 
pretty  well  when  it  was.  But  what  will  you  allow 
me,  now,  for  an  old  stick  ?'  '  Three  halfpence, 
ma'am.'  c  No,  Mrs.  What's  -  your  -  name  ;  allow 
me  threepence,  and  I  will  give  you  two  shillings, 
and  you  may  send  in  your  mop.'  As  Mrs.  Bland 
would  not  agree  to  this,  Mrs.  Nollekens  shut  the 
door  without  wishing  her  a  good  morning  ;  at  the 
same  time  muttering,  loud  enough  to  be  heard,  that 
she  would  go  to  a  man  round  the  corner  who  had 
just  opened  a  turner's  shop. 

Perhaps  it  now  may  be  better,  by  way  of  variety, 
to  give  a  few  of  Mr.  Nollekens'  recollections  ;  but 
before  they  are  related  a  description  of  his  person 
may  not  be  considered  as  out  of  place. 

His  figure  was  short,  his  head  big,  and  it  ap- 
peared much  increased  by  a  large-crowned  hat,  of 


96  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

which  kind  he  was  very  fond  ;  bnt  his  dress- hat, 
which  he  always  sported  when  he  went  to  Court  or 
to  the  Academy  dinners,  was  nearly  flat,  and  he 
brought  it  from  Rome.  His  neck  was  short,  his 
shoulders  narrow,  his  body  too  large,  particularly 
in  the  front  lower  part,  which  resembled  that  of 
Tenducci,  and  many  other  falsetto  singers  ;  he  was 
bow-legged  and  hook-nosed — indeed,  his  leg  was 
somewhat  like  his  nose,  which  resembled  the  rudder 
of  an  Antwerp  packet-boat — his  hips  were  rather 
thin,  but  between  his  brows  there  was  great  evi- 
dence of  study.  He  was  very  fond  of  his  ruffles, 
and  continued  to  wear  them  long  after  they  had 
become  unfashionable  —  indeed,  until  they  were 
worn  out.  A  drab  was  his  favourite  colour,  and 
his  suit  was  generally  made  from  the  same  piece, 
though  now  and  then  he  would  treat  himself  with 
a  striped  Manchester  waistcoat,  of  one  of  which  he 
was  so  fond  that  he  sat  to  Abbott1  for  his  portrait  in 
it,  an  engraving  from  which  may  be  seen  in  Messrs. 
Cadell's  collection  of  interesting  contemporary  por- 
traits, where  he  is  represented  leaning  on  his  bust 
of  Fox,  which  brought  him  into  more  notice  than 
any  other  of  his  productions.  His  dress-stockings 
were  also  rather  remarkable,  being  ornamented  with 
blue  and  white  stripes,  similar  to  those  constantly 
and  so  lately  worn  by  Sir  Thomas  Stepney,  an 
old  member  of  White's,  in  St.  James's  Street,  of 
which  house   of  notorietv  the   annexed  anecdote, 

\J  7 

extracted  from  the  Rev.   W.   Cole's  MSS.  in   the 

1  Francis  Samuel  Abbott,  the  portrait-painter  (1760-1803).     He  was 
a  pupil  of  Hayman.     He  painted  several  portraits  of  Nelson. — Ed. 


HUMOROUS  ADDRESS  97 

British  Museum,  shall  conclude  this  chapter,   and 
may  probably  be  found  entertaining  to  the  reader  : 

'  The  following  humorous  address  was  supposed  to  have  been  written 
by  Colonel  Lyttelton,  brother  to  Sir  George  Lyttelton,  in  1752,  on  his 
Majesty's  return  from  Hanover,  when  numberless  addresses  were 
presented.  White's  Chocolate  House,  near  St.  James's  Palace,  was  the 
famous  gaming-house,  where  most  of  the  nobility  had  meetings  and  a 
society.     It  was  given  to  me  December  8,  1752. 

1  The  Gamesters'  Address  to  the  King. 

'"Most  Righteous  Sovereign, 

'"May  it  please  your  Majesty,  we,  the  lords,  knights,  etc.,  of 
the  Society  of  White's,  beg  leave  to  throw  ourselves  at  your  Majesty's 
feet  ;(our  honours  and  consciences  lying  under  the  table,  and  our 
fortunes  being  ever  at  stake),  and  congratulate  your  Majesty's  happy 
return  to  these  kingdoms,  which  assembles  us  together,  to  the  great 
advantage  of  some,  the  ruin  of  others,  and  the  unspeakable  satisfaction 
of  all,  both  us,  our  wives,  and  children.  We  beg  leave  to  acknowledge 
your  Majesty's  great  goodness  and  lenity  in  allowing  us  to  break  those 
laws  which  we  ourselves  have  made,  and  you  have  sanctified  and  con- 
firmed, while  your  Majesty  alone  religiously  observes  and  regards 
them.  And  we  beg  leave  to  assure  your  Majesty  of  our  most  un- 
feigned loyalty  and  attachment  to  your  sacred  person,  and  that  next 
to  the  kings  of  diamonds,  clubs,  spades,  and  hearts,  we  love,  honour, 
and  adore  you." 

1  To  which  his  Majesty  was  pleased  to  return  this  most  gracious 
answer  : 

1  "  My  Lords  and  Gentlemen, 

'  "  I  return  you  my  thanks  for  your  loyal  address  ;  but  whilst  I 
have  such  rivals  in  your  affection  as  you  tell  me  of,  lean  neither  think 
it  worth  preserving  or  regarding.  I  look  upon  you  yourselves  as  a 
pack  of  cards,  and  shall  deal  with  you  accordingly." '  * 

1  See  Cole's  MSS.,  vol.  xxxi.,  p.  171,  in  the  British  Museum. 


[98] 


CHAPTER  IV. 

Nollekens'  dinner-parties  and  visitors  —  Mr.  Taylor — Economical 
eccentricities  of  Mrs.  Nollekens — Dr.  Johnson — The  sculptor  and 
the  snow  model  in  Oxford  Market — Mr.  White  of  Fleet  Street — 
Mrs.  Nollekens  and  the  modeller  in  butter — Salubrious  air  of 
Hampstead,  and  artists  residing  there — Manoeuvres  of  Mrs.  Nol- 
lekens in  dress,  etc. 

One  day,  when  some  friends  were  expected  to 
dine  with  Mrs.  Nollekens,  poor  Bronze,  labouring 
under  a  severe  sore  throat,  stretching  her  flannelled 
neck  up  to  her  mistress,  hoarsely  announced  c  all 
the  Hawkinses  '  to  be  in  the  dining-parlour  !  Mrs. 
Nollekens,  in  a  half-stifled  whisper,  cried  :  '  Nolly, 
it  is  truly  vexatious  that  we  are  always  served  so 
when  we  dress  a  joint  ;  you  won't  be  so  silly  as  to 
ask  them  to  dinner  ?'  Nollekens :  c  I  ask  them  ! 
let  'em  get  their  meals  at  home  ;  I'll  not  encourage 
the  sort  of  thing  ;  or,  if  they  please,  they  can  go  to 
Mathias's  ;  they'll  find  the  cold  leg  of  lamb  we  left 
yesterday.'  Mrs.  Nollekens :  'No  wonder,  I  am  sure, 
they  are  considered  so  disagreeable  by  Captain  Grose, 
Hampstead  Steevens,  Murphy,  Nichols,  andBoswell.' 
At  this  moment  who  should  come  in  but  Mr. 
John  Taylor1  (who  will  be  often  mentioned  in  this 

1  John  Taylor,  the  portrait-painter  (1739-1838).     He  invested  his 
earnings  in  the  long  annuities,  so  as  to  be  safe  to  the  age  of  one 


JOHN  TAYLOR  99 


work)  ;  he  looked  around  and  wondered  what  all 
the  fuss  could  be  about.  '  Why  don't  you  go  to  your 
dinner,  my  good  friend  ?'  said  he  ;  '  I  am  sure  it 
must  be  ready,  for  I  smell  the  gravy.'  Nollekens, 
to  whom  he  had  spoken,  desired  him  to  keep  his 
nonsense  to  himself.  Taylor :  c  Well,  well,  well,  I 
own  I  ought  to  have  nothing  to  do  with  family 
affairs.  I  see  your  dog  Daphne  has  the  mange  ! 
You  should  put  some  brimstone  in  his  water  ;  it  is 
a  very  fine  purifier  of  the  blood  ;  indeed,  I  take  it 
myself  now  and  then  ;  and  I  recollect  my  old 
friend,  Jonathan  Tyers,  never  suffered  any  of  his 
dogs  to  be  without  it.  Heighday  !'  looking  behind 
the  screen,  c  why,  here's  a  boy  naked !  What, 
Tom,  is  it  you  ?'  l  Yes,  sir,'  replied  I.  Taylor  : 
4  Why,  what  are  you  sitting  for  now  ?  You  were  a 
Cupid  the  other  day.  Oh,  a  Mercury,  I  see — a 
pretty  compliment,  faith  !  Well,  you  must  mind 
what  you're  about.  However,  Nollekens  has  made 
a  god  of  you,  you'll  remember  that.  I  say,  who's 
coming  here  to  dinner,  do  you  know  ?  He  has 
never  asked  me  to  dine  with  him  as  yet ;  I  don't 
know  what  he  may  do  ;  nor  did  he  ever  send  me  a 
slice  of  the  Yarborough  venison.  Well,  perhaps  I 
am  as  well  without  it,  though  I  must  own  I  like 
venison :  Quin  was  fond  of  it,  too.  He  and  my 
master,  Frank  Hayman,1  knew  the  taste  of  it  full 
well  ;  and  I  recollect  when  Lord  Sandwich  gave  a 

hundred,  and   escaped   penury   only   by  dying   in  his   ninety-ninth 
year. — Ed. 

1  Francis  Hayman  (1708-1776)  was  a  foundation  member  of  the 
Royal  Academy. — Ed. 


ioo  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

dinner  to  Lady  Vane  in  Vauxhall  Gardens  the 
haunches  were  fifty  shillings  apiece.' 

This  dispute  had  lasted  so  long  that  perhaps  the 
1  Hawkinses '  overheard  it,  for  they  had  silently  let 
themselves  out  without  even  ringing  the  bell. 
Shortly  after  the  invited  party  arrived,  and  I,  who 
had  been  '  a  very  good  lad,'  was  allowed  to  remain 
in  the  studio  to  finish  my  drawing  for  admission 
into  the  Royal  Academy.  Now,  as  this  room  was 
next  to  the  dining-parlour,  I  could  not  avoid  hear- 
ing part  of  the  conversation,  for,  as  there  was  not 
much  to  eat,  there  were  many  talkers  ;  but  before 
the  company  sat  down  they  were  requested  to  walk 
upstairs  for  a  moment,  to  see  Angelica  Kauff- 
mann's  portrait  of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  who  was  painted 
in  the  character  of  Innocence,  with  a  dove,  of  a 
three-quarter  size,  for  which  she  had  just  received 
£15  15s.  In  the  meantime  Bronze,  who  had  been 
assisting  the  cook  to  put  on  the  dishes,  called  to 
me  through  the  keyhole  :  '  Bless  you,  Master 
Smith,  come  and  see  our  set-out  !'  And  as  the 
scanty  display  for  so  many  persons  astonished  me, 
I  shall  endeavour  to  describe  the  c  spread,'1  as  it  is 
called  at  Cambridge. 

Two  tables  were  joined  ;  but  as  the  legs  of  one 
were  considerably  shorter  than  those  of  the  other, 
four  blocks  of  wood  had  been  prepared  to  receive 
them.  The  damask  tablecloth  was  of  a  coffee- 
colour,  similar  to  that  formerly  preferred  by 
washers   of   Court    ruffles.      I   recollect   that   the 

1  In  English,  'A  few  things,  sufficient   to   keep   body   and   soul 
together.' — Smith. 


A  DINNER  PARTY 


knives  and  forks  matched  pretty  well  ;  but  the 
plates  of  Queen's  ware  had  not  only  been  ill-used 
by  being  put  upon  the  hob,  by  which  they  had  lost 
some  of  their  gadrooned  edges,  but  were  of  an 
unequal  size,  and  the  dishes  were  flat,  and  therefore 
held  little  gravy.  The  dinner  consisted  of  a  roasted 
leg  of  pork,  the  joint  scented  by  their  friend  Taylor ; 
a  salad,  with  four  heads  of  celery  standing  pyra- 
midically  ;  mashed  turnips  neatly  spooned  over  a 
large  flat  plate  to  the  height  of  a  quarter  of  an 
inch  ;  and,  lastly, 

'  Lo  !  a  lobster  introduced  in  state, 
Whose  ample  body  stretches  o'er  the  plate.5 

The  side-dishes  were  a  chicken  and  a  reindeer's 
tongue,  with  parsley  and  butter,  but  the  boat  was 
without  a  ladle,  and  the  plate  hardly  large  enough 
for  it  to  stand  in.  Close  to  Mrs.  Nollekens'  left 
elbow  stood  a  dumb  waiter  with  cheese,  a  slice  of 
butter,  a  few  watercresses,  and  a  change  of  plates, 
knives,  and  forks. 

The  dinner  being  announced,  there  was  a  great 
rustling  of  silks  for  preference  of  places,  and  I 
concluded,  by  the  party  drawing  their  chairs  close, 
they  were  ready  to  begin  ;  but  Bronze  used  to  say : 
1  No  one  could  eat  till  he  was  red  in  the  face  at 
master's  table.'  The  set  at  the  table  consisted  of 
Nollekens,  his  wife,  and  five  on  a  side.  No  chal- 
lenges at  dinner  that  I  heard  of,  nor  do  I  think 
wine  was  even  mentioned  until  the  servants  were 
ordered  to  '  take  off.'  Much  about  this  time  there 
was  a  great  bustle,  in  which  I  distinctly  heard 
Mrs.  Nollekens'  voice  vociferate :    '  I  will  have  it 


102  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

found  !'  At  last  Bronze  entered,  to  whom  she  had 
given  peremptory  commands  to  fetch  it.  Mr. 
Nollekens:  'And,  arter  all,  pray  where  did  you 
find  it  ?'  Bronze :  l  Why,  sir,  under  the  pillow  of 
your  bed.'  '  There,  Mr.  N.,  I  knew  you  had  used 
it  last  night.'  Nollekens  ordered  Bronze  out  of  the 
room,  saying  '  he  never  liked  that  woman  ;  her 
mouth  looked  so  much  like  the  rump  of  a  chicken.' 
This  nameless  article  was  then  caught  first  by  one 
elderly  maiden,  and  then  by  another  ;  and  as  for 
Miss  Welch,  she  declared  a  'back-scratch'  to  be 
the  most  agreeable  thing  imaginable,  and  she  was 
glad  it  was  found,  as  it  had  been  her  mother's, 
adding  that  Cowper  was  perfectly  correct  in  his 
assertion  upon  things  mislaid  : 

1  For  'tis  a  truth  well  known  to  most, 
That  whatsoever  thing  is  lost, 
We  seek  it,  ere  it  come  to  light, 
In  every  cranny  but  the  right.' 

Mrs.  Nollekens :  '  My  dear  Nolly,  you  had  no 
occasion  to  have  wasted  the  writing-paper  for  the 
claret,  for,  as  it  is  the  only  bottle  with  a  tall  neck, 
we  should  have  known  it.  My  dear  Mrs.  Paradice, 
you  may  safely  take  a  glass  of  it,  for  it  is  the  last 
of  twelve  which  Mr.  Caleb  Whitef  oord  sent  us  as 
a  present  ;  and  everybody  who  talks  about  wine 
should  know  his  house  has  ever  been  famous  for 
claret.'  Mr.  Nollekens :  l  Don't  crack  the  nuts  with 
your  teeth,  Miss  Moser  ;  you'll  spoil  them.'  '  Ay, 
and  what  would  Mr.  Fuseli  say  to  that  ?'  asked 
Mr.  Saunders  Welch,  who  now  spake  for  the  first 
time.     The  ladies  at  last  retired,  and  Bronze  soon 


GIFTS  FROM  ENGRA  VERS  icr 


declared  tea  to  be  ready,  upon  which  the  gentlemen 
went  to  the  drawing-room,  though  without  Mr. 
Nollekens,  who  remained  to  give  orders  for  the 
salad  to  be  put  up  again  for  the  next  day. 

On  the  following  morning  Mr.  Taylor  popped  in 
as  usual,  and  wished  to  know,  '  in  the  name  of 
Fortune,'  who  had  dined  there  yesterday  ;  and 
being  told  of  a  few  of  the  persons,  one  of  whom 
had  just  lost  his  wife,  his  memory  served  him 
again  as  to  his  old  master  Hayman.  l  Ay,'  said  he, 
4  my  master,  Frank  Hayman,  was  a  droll  dog.  I 
recollect  when  he  buried  his  wife  a  friend  asked 
him  why  he  expended  so  much  money  on  her 
funeral.  "  Ah,  sir,"  replied  he,  "  she  would  have 
done  as  much,  or  more,  for  me  with  pleasure." 

Mrs.  Nollekens  was  a  collector  of  prints,  by 
receiving  presents  from  those  engravers  who  were 
candidates  for  the  Associates'  chairs  in  the  Royal 
Acadenw.  She  had  several  en^ravin^s  after  Claude, 
with  whom  she  always  expressed  herself  delighted^ 
and  whenever  she  had  occasion  to  show  them  would 
invariably  make  the  following  observation  :  4  It  is 
very  remarkable  that  Claude,  Salvator  Rosa,  and 
Nicholas  Poussin  lived  close  beside  each  other  on 
the  Trinita  del  Monte.' 

Mrs.  Nollekens,  well  knowing  her  dear  father  to 
be  fond  of  a  glass  of  Yorkshire  ale,  endeavoured 
economically  to  procure  a  little,  though  her  attempts 
were  unsuccessful ;  and,  indeed,  she  was  frequently 
heard  to  declare  herself  by  no  means  obliged  to  her 
neighbour,  Mr.  Sparrow,  for  so  often  declining  to 
allow  her  something  for  the  odd  bottles  she  had  in 


104  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

her  cellar.  It  was  true  that  they  were  mostly  of 
different  shapes  and  sizes,  but  that  she  could  not 
help,  as  they  were  all  presents.  '  However,'  added 
she,  c  as  that  is  the  case,  they  would  better  suit  all 
sorts  of  purposes;  he  might  have  taken  them,  particu- 
larly as  I  have  frequently  told  him  Mr.  Nollekens 
did  not  punish  him  for  having  his  bills  stuck 
against  our  yard-gates  when  he  advertised  for  his 
son,'  a  fine  youth,  who  was  afterwards  discovered 
to  have  been  drowned  when  bathing  in  Marylebone 
Basin. 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nollekens,  who  made  a  point  of 
never  visiting  people  at  their  country  lodgings, 
where  there  was  often  too  great  a  makeshift,  had 
no  objection  to  obey  the  truly  kind  commands  of 
Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Sir  William  Chambers,  or 
Mr.  Wilton,1  at  their  delightful  villas,  where  every- 
thing was  perfection  itself ;  but  they  were  more 
particularly  pleased  when  Sir  Joshua  accommo- 
dated Dr.  Johnson  and  themselves  with  seats  in  his 
carriage. 

By  such  an  indulgence  they  not  only  avoided  the 
fare  to  Richmond,  but  by  keeping  the  carriage 
some  time  at  the  door,  to  the  great  annoyance  of 
the  Doctor,  who  once  roared  out,  '  Come,  Nolly  I 
Nolly!'  proved  to  the  Rev.  Mr.  Martin,2  and  other 

1  Joseph  Wilton,  R.A.,  the  sculptor.     See  Prefatory  Essay. — Ed. 

2  Of  this  most  respectable  clergyman,  who  for  many  years  was  Mr. 
Nollekens'  next-door  neighbour,  there  are  two  most  admirable  like- 
nesses, both  painted  and  engraved  by  Linnell.  Mr.  Martin,  whose 
literary  works  are  well  known,  for  many  years  had  a  chapel  in  Grafton 
Street,  Soho,  from  whence  he  went  to  an  entirely  new  one  in  Keppel 
Street,  Russell  Square. — Smith. 


A  SNOW  HOUSE  105 


neighbours  in  Mortimer  Street,  who  were  sure  at 
that  moment  to  be  applied  to  for  her  lost  cat,  how 
much  they  were  respected  by  the  President  of  the 
Eoyal  Academy  and  the  renowned  Dr.  Johnson, 
the  latter  being  at  that  time  so  popular  that  gentle- 
men continued  to  pass  and  repass,  purposely  to  feed 
their  sight  upon  so  excellent  and  learned  a  character. 

During:  a  severe  frost,  after  a  heavv  fall  of  snow, 
an  Oxford  Market  butcher  meeting  Nollekens  at 
the  barber's,  requested  him  to  visit  a  snow  house, 
which  he  and  several  other  lads  of  the  steel  had 
erected,  in  which  he  said  twelve  pretty  corpulent 
people  could  comfortably  dine.  Our  sculptor,  being 
always  fond  of  sights,  went  with  him,  when  a  few 
greasy  brothers  of  the  knife  surrounded  him  within, 
and  swore  they  would  not  let  him  out  unless  he 
paid  his  footing.  The  R.A.,  however,  gave  them 
only  sixpence,  insisting  that  it  was  quite  enough 
for  a  model  in  snow,  which  so  exasperated  the 
brutal  architects  that  the  wickedest  son  of  Palladio 
thawed  with  a  warm,  smoky  poker  the  name  of 
Nollekens  upon  the  outside  of  the  hut,  which 
induced  the  observers  to  believe  and  report  that  he 
had  made  it. 

This  most  scandalous  insinuation  annoyed  Mrs. 
Nollekens  exceedingly,  and  the  butchers  insisted 
upon  her  giving  them  five  shillings  to  take  it  out, 
which  demand  she  paid,  and  afterwards  went  by 
the  appellation  of  their  Frosty  Friend.  Indeed, 
for  a  long  time  Nollekens  was  bantered  by  Barry, 
the  painter — who,  though  he  could  not  bear  a  joke, 
knew  pretty  well  where  to  pass  one,  and  was  per- 


106  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

fectly  master  of  wit  enough  to  render  it  a  nuisance 
to  those  at  whose  door  he  thought  proper  to  throw 
it — who  gave  Nollekens  the  nickname  of  a  '  Frozen- 
hearted  Architect,'  who  could '  so  coolly,  in  such  an 
inclement  season,  deliberately  erect  a  mansion  with 
neither  a  door,  a  window,  nor  a  fireplace.  And 
how,  in  the  name  of  Fortune,  he  could  think  of 
gaining  a  tenant  to  reimburse  himself  for  two 
weeks  together,  was  to  his  friends  quite  enig- 
matical. However,  there  was  one  thing  which 
even  his  enemies  could  not  charge  him  with — a 
fault  too  common  anions;  manv  modern  builders — 
he  had  not  laid  a  rotten  foundation.' 

No  friend  could  perplex  Mrs.  Nollekens  more 
than  by  presenting  her  with  a  turkey,  when  she 
was  without  a  cook  to  draw  the  sinews  of  the  legs, 
as  every  poulterer  in  the  neighbourhood  had  re- 
peatedly refused  her  custom,  in  consequence  of 
her  tiresome  mode  of  offering  them  less  than  the 
market  price  for  their  chickens,  and  always  leaving 
their  shops  without  once  making  a  single  purchase, 
so  that  her  only  means  of  procuring  poultry  was 
of  the  higglers  :  their  fowls,  she  found  out,  were 
either  so  ill  fed,  or  of  such  an  enormous  age,  that 
there  was  no  gravy  to  follow  the  knife,  a  sure 
proof,  she  observed,  that  they  could  neither  be  the 
genuine  Dorking  nor  the  true  '  barn-door  birds.' 

There  was  one  man,  however,  a  cheesemonger, 
then  living  at  the  corner  of  Wells  Street,  who 
always  got  the  whip-hancl  of  her  in  an  exchange 
for  butter  whenever  she  had  more  game  in  the 
house  than  would  well  keep  for  use ;    for  as  to 


EXCHANGE  NO  ROBBERY  107 

giving  any  away,  that  was  an  act  she  could  not 
honestly  record  in  her  diary  whilst  she  could  get 
Mr.  Mason's  butter  in  return,  cheese  being  never 
allowed  nor  seen  in  her  house,  but  at  set  dinners, 
when,  as  there  was  a  partition  in  the  old  family 
tray,  she  generally  sported  samples  of  two  sorts, 
taking  particular  care  that  they  should  not  be  too 
heavy  for  Bronze  to  put  on  over  the  head  of  her 
master. 

When  straw  hats  had  become  unfashionable, 
Mrs.  Nollekens  hinted  to  old  White,  the  hatter  of 
Fleet  Street,  who  frequently  came  to  show  Nolle  - 
kens  one  of  his  Roman  medals  or  a  lamp,  that 
possibly  he  could  accommodate  her  with  a  Leghorn 
hat  at  a  moderate  rate.  White,  who  was  a  cunning 
old  fox,  and  well  knew  how  to  plough  with  another 
man's  heifer,  seldom  visited  Mr.  Nollekens'  studio, 
by  way  of  getting  the  loan  of  a  model,  or  a  squeeze 
of  something  old  or  singularly  curious,  without  first 
looking  into  the  parlour  to  see  how  his  dear  friend 
Welch's  daughter  was,  at  the  same  time  taking 
care  to  present  her  with  an  old-fashioned  hat,  well 
knowing  that  she  cut  them  into  more  modern 
shapes,  and  covered  them  either  with  velvet  from 
an  old  tippet,  or  a  silk  hatband.  Nollekens,  finding 
his  wife  always  benefited  by  these  visits,  never 
refused  White  a  squeeze  of  a  patera,  or  anything 
that  would  answer  his  purpose  ;  and  at  the  same 
time,  when  he  was  gone,  he  readily  joined  in  the 
laugh  against  old  Gerrard,  and  the  other  fools  who 
had  been  for  years  duped  by  old  White,  who  had 
turned  his  wine-cellars  into  manufactories  for  the 


108  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

produce  of  cast  coins,  and  modern  squeezes  from 
Roman  lamps. 

These  imitations  White  put  into  auctions  and 
venders'  shops  for  sale,  and  they  were  actually 
bought  with  avidity  by  the  profound  judges  and 
collectors  of  such  trash,  who  would,  when  the 
secret  was  discovered,  rather  than  acknowledge 
their  own  want  of  judgment  in  such  matters,  boldly 
insist  upon  their  originality,  and  call  the  man  who 
declared  himself  as  their  fabricator  '  an  impudent 
impostor.'  White  has  not  been  the  only  one  whose 
performances  have  deceived  unwary  collectors  ;  and 
even  the  learned  have  sometimes  been  pleased  to 
impose  copies  upon  themselves,  to  the  no  little 
injury  of  the  man  of  real  taste  and  talent,  who 
produced  some  of  their  boasted  treasures  from  the 
rough  material.  There  can  be  little  doubt  as  to  the 
possibility  of  deceiving  collectors  in  almost  every 
pursuit ;  and  I  should  expect  that  if  the  imitations 
of  Greek  and  Roman  art  could  declare  themselves, 
many  a  curious  tale  could  be  told  by  some  of  those 
now  hoarded  up  in  cabinets,  for  which  pretty  heavy 
sums  have  been  given  by  their  happy  possessors. 

I  must  own  Mrs.  Xollekens  had  one  quality 
which  dignifies  a  superior  woman — she  seldom  inter- 
fered in  her  husband's  profession  and  concerns 
with  the  world,  and  during  the  whole  of  my 
observations  upon  that  lady's  deportment  I  wit- 
nessed only  two  liberties,  if,  indeed,  they  may  be 
called  so,  that  she  took  with  her  Nolly's  profes- 
sional career,  and  one  was  when  that  great  article 
of  consumption,  butter,  was  concerned.    One  morn- 


A  HANDSOME  MODEL  109 

ing  a  very  handsome  woman,  who  lodged  in  the 
first-floor  of  No.  5,  Oxford  Market,  modestly 
rapped  at  the  door.  Mr.  Nollekens,  who  was 
giving  me  instructions  to  knead  the  clay  for  a  bust 
of  Mr.  Mathias,  according  to  his  usual  custom, 
answered  the  knock,  and  when  he  saw  the  beautiful 
creature,  whom  I  had  seen  over  the  window-blinds, 
he  said :  c  Come  in,  my  dear ;  who  sent  you  to  me  ?' 
c  No  one,  sir ;  my  friends  tell  me  I  have  a  peculiar 
talent  for  modelling  in  butter,  and  I  have  brought 
a  few  pigs  and  sheep  in  this  butter-boat  to  show 
you.'  '  Walk  in,  walk  in ;  this  is  only  my  pupil, 
and  he  won't  say  a  word  about  it.'  c  I  beg  your 
pardon,  sir,  for  the  intrusion ;  perhaps  I  ought  to 
have  informed  you  that  I  am  a  housekeeper  in  want 
of  a  situation,  and  finding  that  the  knowledge  of 
modelling  animals  in  butter  would  greatly  add  to 
my  recommendation,  I  have  taken  the  liberty  of 
submitting  the  little  things  I  have  done  to  vour 
inspection.' 

At  this  moment  the  studio -door  was  opened, 
and  Mrs.  Nollekens,  with  her  usual  precision 
of  words,  stepped  up  to  her  husband,  and,  putting 
her  finger  upon  his  sleeve,  said :  '  Surely  Mr. 
Nollekens  will  not  suffer  himself  to  be  looked 
upon  in  the  light  of  a  pastrycook  !  What  have 
you,  my  dear  sir,  to  do  with  modelling  in  butter  ? 
the  world  will  say  that  you  have  taught  Mrs. — 
what  is  your  name,  my  good  woman  ?'  '  Wilmot.' 
— '  Mrs.  Wilmot  to  model  in  butter !  Pray,  are  you 
married,  Mrs.  Wilmot  ?'  ;  No,  I  can't  say  I  am 
married,  ma'am.'     '  Mr.  Nollekens,  I  wish  to  sjoeak 


no  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


with  you  in  the  next  room.'  What  was  said  there 
I  know  not,  but  Mrs.  Wilmot  observed  to  me,  '  She 
is  jealous — so  far  my  good  looks  are  against  me.' 

In  what  way  Mr.  Nollekens  was  prevailed  upon 
I  cannot  tell,  but  true  it  is  he  did  not  return  into 
the  room,  though  his  wife  entered,  who  delivered 
the  following  address  to  the  handsome  housekeeper : 
1  Mr.  Nollekens  is  extremely  sorry  to  say  that  his 
professional  engagements  at  this  season  of  the  year 
will  not  permit  him  to  attend  to  your  wishes,  but 
that,  if  you  will  leave  your  address  with  me,  he  will 
consider  himself  your  debtor.'     Mrs.  Wilmot  gave 
the  address  as  before  mentioned,  and  then,  after 
replacing  her  lambs,  sheep,  and  pigs  in  the  butter- 
boat, retired  gracefully ;   at  least,  in  my   opinion, 
though  at  that  time,  I  must  own,  my  ideas  of  grace 
were  not  very  extensive.     It  was  curious  to  remark 
that  for  some  time  after  the  visit  from  the  beautiful 
butter-modeller  of  Oxford  Market,  Mrs.  Nollekens 
made  her  husband  pass  the  lady's  door,  in  order  to 
discover  how  far  he  had  an  inclination  to  improve 
her  acquaintance. 

After  this  rencontre,  Mrs.  Nollekens  ventured 
occasionally  to  give  an  opinion  as  to  the  propriety 
of  professional  applications  to  Mr.  Nollekens  ;  for 
I  recollect  another  intrusion  upon  him  of  a  similar 
kind,  by  a  person  who  cut  out  castles,  rocks,  and 
mountains  upon  the  backs  of  shells,  and  all  with  a 
common  penknife.  Here,  for  the  love  of  the  true 
character  of  Nolly's  professional  life,  she  again 
interfered,  observing  to  him  that  he  ought  not  to 
attend  to  such  visitors.     '  You  might  just  as  well,' 


THE  VALE  OF  HEALTH 


continued  she,  l  praise  the  carvings  upon  a  Wycher- 
lev  comb,  so  carefully  preserved  by  the  collectors 
of  old  china  and  such  gimcracks.  Why,  bless  my 
heart  !  soon,  sir,  you  will  have  the  man  who 
dresses  Dr.  Lettsom's  glass  wig,  to  know  how  he 
ought  to  replace  a  deficient  curl,  or  how  much  of 
its  possessor's  face  it  should  cover,  so  that  his 
forehead  might  be  seen  to  the  best  advantage.' 

Mrs.  Nollekens,  from  her  mother's  experience, 
insisted  that  it  was  by  far  the  cheapest  and  least 
troublesome  plan  for  a  single  person,  whose  health 
required  fresh  air,  and  was  unattended  by  a  servant, 
to  lodge  at  a  regular  boarding-house,  as  the  lower 
class  of  people,  in  general,  who  let  lodgings,  were 
much  addicted  to  pilfer  from  every  article  of  con- 
sumption. 

Towards  the  later  part  of  her  life  she  expressed 
a  wish  to  go  once  more  to  Hampstead,  a  spot 
considered  by  most  physicians  and  landscape- 
painters  as  the  most  salubrious  and  beautiful  of  all 
the  Montpeliers  of  England  ;  but  she  could  neither 
make  up  her  mind  as  to  the  enormous  expense 
of  its  accommodations,  nor  as  to  the  peculiar 
fragrance  of  its  seven  sorts  of  air,  which  of  them 
she  ought  then  to  prefer.  The  latter  perplexity 
afforded  her  at  times  much  conversation  ;  and  when 
she  was  requested  to  name  the  seven  airs,  she, 
in  an  elevated  voice,  stated  them  thus :  '  My  dear 
sir,  there  are  the  four  sides  of  the  hill,  each  re- 
ceiving freely  the  air  from  the  four  quarters. 
There  is  the  hill  itself,  very  clear,  but  certainly 
often  bleak.     Then  there  is  the  "  Vale  of  Health," 


ii2  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

as  it  is  called,  in  a  stagnate  bottom  ;  a  pit  in  the 
heath,  where,  if  a  bit  of  paper  is  whirling  in  the 
air,  it  can  never  rise  above  the  high  ground  about 
it.  And  is  there  not  also  the  mild  air  of  the  centre 
of  the  town,  where  the  situation,  though  high,  is 
entirely  sheltered  by  surrounding  buildings  ?' 

Wilson,  Gainsborough,  Loutherbourg,  and  Kirk 
for  several  years  had  lodgings  at  Hampstead,  and 
made  that  spot  the  seat  of  their  morning  and 
evening  study ;  and  Collins  and  Linnell,  now 
inhabitants,  are  constantly  seen  culling  its  beauties. 
It  is  also  occasionally  the  residence  of  Beechey, 
Phillips  and  Westall ;  and  I  have  seen  Callcott, 
Arnald,  the  Reinagles,  Burnet,  and  Martin  enjoy- 
ing its  luxuriant  windings.  Old  Oram,1  the  land- 
scape-painter, and  member  of  the  Board  of  Works, 
who  was  a  man  of  some  genius,  inhabited  the  house 
south  of  Jack  Straw's  Castle.  And  it  was  to 
Hampstead  that  Hayley's  friend,  Romney,  the 
painter,  retired  in  the  decline  of  his  life,  when  he 
built  a  dining-room  close  to  his  kitchen,  with  a 
buttery-hatch  opening  into  it,  so  that  he  and  his 
friends  might  enjoy  beef-steaks,  hot  and  hot,  upon 
the  same  plan  as  the  members  of  the  Beefsteak 
Club  are  supplied  at  their  room  in  the  Lyceum. 

No  persons  could  more  cordially  hate  each  other 
than  Romney  and  Nollekens ;  Mr.  Greville, 
Hayley,  and  Flaxman  were  stanch  friends  of  the 
former,  who,  from  some  pique,  objected  to  the 
latter  modelling  from  any  of  his  portraits.     Flax- 

1  William  Oram,  a  decorator  of  country  houses,  and  from   1748 
master  carpenter  of  all  his  Majesty's  works. — Ed. 


GROCERIES  113 

man,  on  the  contrary,  was  so  great  a  favourite  with 
Romney  that,  in  his  letters  to  Hayley,  he  abso- 
lutely idolizes  him  ;  and  in  one,  written  at  the  time 
he  was  hourly  expected  in  London  from  Rome,  he 
exultingly  exclaims :    '  Huzza  !  Flaxman's  arrived  !' 

To  return.  Hampstead  has  been  for  years  re- 
sorted to  by  Barret,  Fielding,  Glover,  Hills,  Hunt, 
Prout,  Pyne,  Robson,  the  Varleys,  and  all  the 
other  celebrated  water-colour  draughtsmen,  whose 
productions  have  so  astonishingly  surpassed  those 
of  their  predecessors,  both  in  this  and  in  every 
other  country. 

My  old  school-fellow,  Smith,  the  grocer,  of 
Margaret  Street,  has  been  frequently  heard  to 
declare  that,  whenever  Mrs.  Nollekens  purchased 
tea  and  sugar  at  his  father's  shop,  she  always 
requested,  just  at  the  moment  she  was  quitting  the 
counter,  to  have  either  a  clove  or  a  bit  of  cinnamon 
to  take  some  unpleasant  taste  out  of  her  mouth  ; 
but  she  never  was  seen  to  apply  it  to  the  part  so 
affected  :  so  that,  with  Nollekens'  nutmegs,  which 
he  pocketed  from  the  table  at  the  Academy 
dinners,  they  contrived  to  accumulate  a  little  stock 
of  spices  without  any  expense  whatever. 

Mrs.  Nollekens'  friends,  after  frequently  wonder- 
ing to  see  her  in  shoes  so  varied  in  their 
embroidery,  and  being  well  aware  that  she  would 
never  think  of  indulging  in  such  expensive  articles 
in  a  spick-and-span  new  state,  all  agreed  that  she 
certainly  must  have  purchased  them  second-hand  ; 
and  by  their  maids,  who  were  encouraged  to 
\ pump'  Bronze,  were  satisfied  that  it  was  really 

8 


114  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

the  fact ;  and  were  also  informed  that  her  muffs 
and  parasols  were  obtained  in  the  same  way.  Mrs. 
Nollekens  would  often  plume  herself  with  borrowed 
feathers  ;  a  shawl  or  a  muff  of  a  friend  she  never 
refused  when  returning  home,  observing  that  she 
was  quite  sure  they  would  keep  her  warm,  never 
caring  how  they  suffered  from  the  rain,  so  that  her 
neighbours  saw  her  apparelled  in  what  they  had 
never  before  seen  her  wear. 


[  '15  ] 


CHAPTER  V. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  fancies  and  his  wife's  jealousy — Anecdote  of  the 
sculptor,  Dr.  Johnson,  and  Mrs.  Thrale  — Lord  Bes[s]  borough- 
Charles  Bannister — The  sculptor's  assistants  and  pupils — Dr.  John- 
son's encouragement  of  the  author— Instances  of  benevolence  and 
eccentricity  in  Mr.  Nollekens — Notices  of  his  relations— Saunders 
Welch,  his  father-in-law — Anecdote  of  Wilkes — Henry  Fielding  and 
his  character  from  life — Dr.  Johnson's  intimacy  with  the  Welch 
family — Death,  epitaph,  and  will  of  Mr.  Welch — Recollections  of 
him  by  Mrs.  Nollekens — His  prudence  and  resolution  as  a  magis- 
trate— Silver  teapot  and  other  relics  of  Dr.  Johnson — Mr.  Welch's 
humanity — Anecdotes  of  Wilson. 

Of  all  the  varieties  of  itinerant  amusements  before 
Mr.  Punch  came  into  vogue,  none  seemed  to  give 
Nollekens  more  pleasure  than  the  milkmaids'  dance 
on  May  Day,  of  which  he  was  so  avowed  an 
admirer  that  Mrs.  Crosdale,  my  old  schoolmistress 
and  his  opposite  neighbour,  assured  me  that  she  one 
May  Day  witnessed  no  less  than  five  garlands,  and 
their  lasses,  who  had  danced  at  his  parlour  window, 
to  each  of  whom  he  had  given  half  a  crown. 

This  indulgence  of  his  was  considered  by  Mrs. 
Nollekens  as  a  great  piece  of  extravagance,  until 
she  discovered  from  Bronze  that  it  was  the  custom 
of  most  of  the  abandoned  women  who  sat  to  him 
for  his  Venuses  to  hire  themselves  as  dancers  upon 
those  occasions  ;  and  as  he  constantly  promised  to 


u6  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


give  each  of  them  something  when  they  came,  he 
always  made  a    point  of   staying  at  home  to   see 
them  display  their  agility.     Sometimes  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens,  whose  exquisite  feelings  induced  her  to  stand 
at  a  distance  to  watch  their  lascivious  movements, 
would    rate    him    for    descending    to    such    low 
pleasures.     '  A  man  like  you,'  she  would  say,  '  who 
could   obtain    orders    at   any  time   for  the    Opera 
House,  where  you  could  see  Vestris,  and  who  is 
visited  by  the  Noveres — how  you  can  agitate  your 
feet  as  you  do,  at  such  strumming,  is  to  me  per- 
fectly astonishing  !     See  !  look  over  the  way  at  the 
first-floor  window  of  the  Sun  and  Horseshoe  ;  the 
landlord  and  his  wife  are  laughing  at  you:  and  I 
declare,  there  is  Finney,  your  brute  of  a  mason, 
yes,   and  his  son  Kit,  ay,  and  old  John   Panzetta, 
the  polisher,  looking  over  their   shoulders.     How 
can   you    so   expose   yourself,  Mr.   Nollekens  ?     I 
wish  from  my  heart   Dr.  Burney  would   come  in 
just  now  !  and  I  am  quite  sure  that  Miss  Hawkins, 
poor  as  her  ear  is  for  music,  whose  playing,  as  the 
Doctor  says,  distracts  one  to  hear-^-even  she,  I  say, 
could  never  be  pleased  with  such  trash  as  you  are 
now   listening   to.'     But   lie   was    deaf  to   all   her 
remonstrances,  and  continued  to  move  his  head  to 
the  movement  of  the  feet  of  the  girls,  with  as  much 
gratification  as  the  man  of  real  taste  and  feeling 
expresses  at  this  day,  when  he  is  riveted  to  the 
magic  sweetness  of  Samuel  Wesley's1  voluntaries. 

Bronze,  my  informant,  also  stated  that,  as  soon 
as  Nolly  had  left  the  room  to  get  his  half-crown, 

1  The  organist  and  musical  composer  (1766-1837). — Ed. 


CURT  A  IN  LECTURES  1 1 7 

Mrs.  Nollekens,  after  slowly  and  silently  creeping 
to  his  abdicated  place  at  the  window,  made  the  spot 
just  in  time  to  catch  a  hussy's  wanton  and  decoy- 
ing leer,  intended  for  her  husband,  at  the  very 
tantalizing  moment  that  the  blind  disciple  of 
G-eminiani  was  striking  up  Arnold's  rondo  of 
4  Come,  thou  rosy  dimpled  boy  !'  Upon  his  re- 
entering the  room,  her  face  being  reddened  and  her 
anger  raised,  she  recommenced  her  lecture  with 
redoubled  vociferation  till  the  dance  was  over ; 
after  which,  finding  her  jobations  of  no  avail,  and 
having  paced  the  carpet  pretty  often,  and  as  often 
convinced  herself  that  her  gloves  fitted  closely  to 
her  fingers,  she,  bursting  with  passion,  vowed  to 
tell  her  sister.  '  So  do,'  returned  Nolly ;  '  and 
then  she'll  tell  you  what  a  great  fool  you  was  for 
having  me,  as  she  always  does.'  c  You  filthy 
thing  !'  rejoined  Mrs.  Nollekens  ;  '  your  grovelling 
birth  protects  you  from  my  chastisement.'  '  Come, 
I  like  that  vastly,'  rejoined  her  husband  ;  '  true  it 
is,  your  father  possessed  a  "plum";1  but  then  it 
was  only  a  grocer's  one.  Why,  I  had  five  times 
the  money  he  died  worth  when  I  made  you  my 
wife  ;  and  you  know  what  you  whispered  to  me  in 
bed  about  your  mother.  Come,  let  us  have  no 
more  of  your  impertinence  ;  I  won't  stand  it — now, 
once  for  all,  I  tell  you  that.'  Just  as  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens opened  the  door,  she  exclaimed  :  '  What, 
you're  here,  Mr.  Eavesdropper !  and  pray,  Mr. 
Christopher,  what  do  you  want  ?'     '  Why,  ma'am, 

1  A  'plum'  in  former  days  was  indicative  of  a  definite  amount 
(£10,000),  just  as  'a  pony 'or  'a  monkey'  is  now.  But  a  'grocer's 
plum'  must  evidently  must  have  been  much  less. — Ed. 


n8  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

there's  the  woman  that  Mr.  Cos  way  recommended 
at  the  yard-gate,  dancing  to  "  Jack-in-the-Green," 
and  wants  to  see  master.'  '  Indeed  !  There,  sir  ! 
there  is  another  of  your  women  !  What  !  and  you 
will  go  to  her,  too  !  It's  very  well,  sir  !  mighty 
well,  sir  !  Oh,  fie  !  fie  !  The  first  year  of  our 
marriage  you  told  me  you  should  dispense  with 
such  people ;  hut  you  are  like  all  the  rest  of  your 
sex,  always  seeking  for  new  beauties  !' 

Just  as  Nollekens  had  closed  his  leathern  bag, 
and  was  about  to  leave  Jack's  lady,  a  high  person- 
age, who  came  to  sit  for  her  busto,  was  announced  ; 
and  then  the  lecture  rested  till  the  nocturnal  curtains 
were  drawn,  when  Bronze  heard  the  culprit  mumble 
for  some  time,  as  is  usual  in  such  cases,  before  the 
curtains  of  his  eyes  were  suffered  to  drop  for  the 
enjoyment  of  balmy  and  refreshing  sleep. 

Mrs.  Thrale  one  morning  entered  NoUekens' 
studio,  accompanied  by  Dr.  Johnson,  to  see  the  bust 
of  Lord  Mansfield,  when  the  sculptor  vociferated  : 
4 1  like  your  picture  by  Sir  Joshua  very  much.  He 
tells  me  it's  for  Thrale,  a  brewer,  over  the  water  : 
his  wife's  a  sharp  woman,  one  of  the  blue-stocking 
people.'  '  Nolly,  Nolly,'  observed  the  Doctor,  S I 
wish  your  maid  would  stop  your  foolish  mouth  with 
a  bluebag.'  At  which  Mrs.  Thrale  smiled,  and 
whispered  to  the  Doctor :  '  My  dear  sir,  you'll  get 
nothing  by  blunting  your  arrows  upon  a  block.' 

The  late   Earl    of   Bes[s] borough1  was  so  well 

1  William,  second  Earl  of  Bessborough,  who  died  in  1793,  in  his 
ninetieth  year.  He  was  a  statesman  of  some  temporary  eminence. 
—Ed. 


LORD  BESSBOROUGH  119 

known  to  Nollekens'  dog,  that  whenever  the  animal 
saw  his  lordship's  leg  within  the  gate  he  ceased 
barking,  and  immediately  welcomed  the  visitor,  who 
always  brought  a  French  roll  in  his  blue  great-coat 
pocket  for  him,  with  which  his  lordship  took  great 
pleasure  in  feeding  him.  But  whenever  he  had  been 
thus  fed,  Nollekens  would  say,  when  cutting  his 
meat,  '  There,  that's  enough  for  you ;  you  have  had 
a  roll  to-day,  the  other  half  will  do  for  to-morrow.' 

Whilst  I  am  speaking  of  this  truly  benevolent 
nobleman,  I  will  take  the  opportunity  of  observing 
that  I  have  heard  my  father  relate  the  following 
anecdotes  of  him  : 

His  lordship  was  once  standing  to  see  the  work- 
men pull  down  the  wooden  railing  and  brickwork 
which  surrounded  the  centre  of  Cavendish  Square, 
when  a  sailor  walked  up  to  him  and  asked  him  for 
a  quid  of  tobacco.  His  lordship  answered  :  '  My 
friend,  I  don't  take  tobacco.'  '  Don't  you  ?'  rejoined 
the  sailor  ;  '  I  wish  you  did,  master,  for  I  have  not 
had  a  bit  to-day.'  As  he  was  turning  away,  his 
lordship  called  to  him  and  said,  '  Here,  my  friend, 
here  is  something  that  will  enable  you  to  buy 
tobacco,'  and  gave  him  half  a  crown. 

At  another  time,  a  poor  woman  with  two  children, 
who  appeared  much  distressed,  but  was  remarkably 
clean,  curtseyed  to  his  lordship  as  he  was  passing  ; 
he  drew  out  his  purse,  but  in  attempting  to  give 
her  two  shillings  they  dropped,  and  rolled  into  the 
kennel,  upon  which  his  lordship,  after  picking  them 
up,  wiped  them  with  his  pocket-handkerchief  before 
he  gave  them  to  the  distressed  widow. 


NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Mr.  Nollekens,  who  was  honoured  with  frequent 
visits  from  his  lordship,  once  asked  his  assistants 
in  the  studio  if  they  had  noticed  his  diamond 
buckles,  adding  that,  as  they  had  belonged  to  his 
wife,  he  had  worn  them  in  common  ever  since  her 
ladyship's  death. 

I  was  one  time  assisting  Mr.  Nollekens  in  the 
parlour,  in  piling  up  clay  for  a  bust  of  General 
Paoli,  when  his  attention  was  called  away  by  Mrs. 
Nollekens,  who  cried  out :  '  Nolly,  Nolly,  come 
here  !  There's  old  Bannister  over  the  way,  who 
used  to  mimic  the  cats  in  the  gutter  at  Marylebone 
Gardens,  when  my  father's  friend,  Tommy  Lowe, 
was  manager  !'  Nollekens  :  i  He's  a  good-looking 
John  Bull  ;  his  son  was  a  student  in  our  Royal 
Academy,  he  studied  under  Loutherbourg  (called 
Leatherbag  in  the  play).  I  remember  he  used  to 
frighten  our  old  John  devilishly  with  his  tragedy 
tricks.'  Miss  Moser  and  Mrs.  Carter  being  present 
at  these  remarks,  '  My  father,'  observed  the  former, 
4  was  glad  when  he  left  the  Academy,  though  he 
liked  him  so  well  that  he  took  a  whole  box  at  his 
first  appearance  ;  and  he  was  nobly  received,  I 
assure  you.'  Mrs.  Nollekens :  '  He  is  a  most 
excellent  actor.'  i  Ay,'  observed  the  celebrated 
Mrs.  Carter,  as  she  was  returning  to  the  fireside, 
4  and  what  is  still  more,  he  bears  the  best  of 
characters  off  the  stage,  for  he  is  known  under  the 
friendly  appellation  of  Honest  Jack.' 

It  is  related  of  Charles  Bannister  that,  when  re- 
turning to  town  from  Epsom  in  a  gig,  accompanied  by 
a  friend,  they  found  themselves  pennyless  when  they 


BANNISTER 


arrived  at  Kensington  Gate,  where  the  man  would  not 
let  them  pass  without  paying  the  toll.  Bannister, 
however,  offered  to  sing  him  a  song,  and  immediately 
struck  np  the  '  Tempest  of  War ' ;  his  voice  was 
heard  afar,  and  '  Bannister,  Bannister!'  was  the  cry. 
The  gate  was  soon  thronged,  and  he  was  loudly 
encored  by  the  voters  returning  from  Brentford  ; 
this  he  complied  with,  and  the  turnpike  man  de- 
clared him  to  be  4  a  noble  fellow,'  and  that  he 
would  pay  fifty  tolls  for  him  at  any  gate. 

By  this  time  William  Arminger,  the  young  man 
whom  Nollekens  had  employed  in  cutting  Dr.  Gold- 
smith's epitaph,  had  become  extremely  useful  to 
him,  for  he  had  by  slow  degrees  improved  himself 
in  the  art  of  cutting  marble  as  a  sculptor.  My 
father  was  then  Nollekens'  principal  assistant  ; 
and  Delvaux,  a  nephew  of  the  sculptor  of  that 
name,  Plara,  the  elder  Gahagan,1  and  Green,2  were 
among  his  best  workmen. 

1  Sebastian  Gahagan,  an  Irishman,  and  the  most  skilful  of  a  family 
of  modellers. — Ed. 

2  The  son  of  the  celebrated  actress,  the  daughter  of  Hippesley,  and 
pupil  of  Kitty  Clive.  At  this  time  Mr.  Charles  Townley  was  a 
constant  visitor  to  the  studio,  and  I  remember  him  as  being  the  first 
patron  who  ever  gave  me  money  as  an  encouragement  to  proceed  in 
my  studies  ;  for  upon  his  noticing  a  drawing  which  I  was  then 
making,  he  took  out  his  purse  and  presented  me  with  half  a  guinea  to 
buy  chalks  and  paper.  But  what  is  more  singular  in  my  humble 
history  is  that  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson  came  up  to  me  the  same  day,  and 
feeling  for  my  head,  put  his  hand  upon  it,  and  said,  '  Very  well, 
Aratus  !'  that  being  the  bust  I  was  copying.  I  can  perfectly  remember 
the  figure  of  that  awkward  and  mighty  man,  whose  benevolence, 
loyalty,  and  strict  religious  principles  will  ever  stand  high  examples  to 
mankind,  notwithstanding  the  numerous  attacks  which  have  fre- 
quently been  made  upon  his  reputation. — Smith. 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


It  is  not  because  it  lias  been  stated  that  Mr. 
Nollekens  was  little  more  than  one  remove  from  an 
idiot  that  I  should  omit  mentioning  an  act  of  charity 
bestowed  by  him  on  a  fellow-creature. 

The  first  act  of  Jiis  relaxation  from  meanness 
which  I  witnessed  was  the  following :  An  artist, 
named  George  Eichardson,  who  published  several 
useful  works,1  particularly  upon  architectural  de- 
corations, was  an  old  man  at  the  period  I  speak  of, 
and  lived  at  No.  105,  Titchfield  Street,  for  many 
years,  during  which  time  he  occasionally  walked 
around  the  studio.  One  day  he  was  asked  by  Mr. 
Nollekens  what  made  him  look  so  dull.  '  I  am 
low-spirited,'  he  replied.  '  Then  go  to  the  pump 
and  take  a  drink  of  water,'  was  the  advice  in  return. 
The  poor  old  man,  after  remaining  a  few  minutes 
looking  vacantly  about  him,  went  away  in  tears.  Mr. 
Nollekens,  who  had  just  before  been  summoned  to 
dinner,  upon  his  return  observed  to  my  father  that 
Eichardson  '  looked  glumpish.'  c  Ah,  sir!'  rejoined 
my  father,  '  he  is  distressed,  poor  fellow  !  and  you 
have  hurt  his  feelings  by  desiring  him  to  go  to  the 
pump  for  relief.  He  was  in  tears  when  he  left  us.' 
c  Bless  me,  I  hurt  him!'  cried  Nollekens,  and  hastily 
walked  out  with  his  head  foremost,  putting  both 
hands  into  his  pockets. 

The  next  morning  Mr.  Eichardson  was  waiting 
at  the  studio  for  my  father,  to  whom  he  gratefully 
expressed  himself  for  what  he  had  said  to  Mr. 
Nollekens,  who  had  been  with  him  the  preceding 

1  He  was  the  author  of  '  The  New  Vitruvius  Britannicus,'  and  of 
1  A  Complete  System  of  Architecture.' — Ed. 


GEORGE  RICHARDSON  123 

evening,  and,  after  asking  if  lie  were  offended  with 
him  for  recommending  the  pump,  stated  that  when 
he  was  low-spirited  the  pump  always  brought  him 
to.  Mr.  Richardson,  upon  disclosing  his  circum- 
stances, expressed  a  wish  to  leave  the  world  in 
the  same  room  in  which  his  wife  died.  '  Well,' 
observed  Nollekens,  '  and  why  should  von  not  die 
there  ?  it's  only  a  garret.  Let  the  rest  of  the 
house,  man  ;  you'll  live  rent  free.  One  room  will 
do  for  von  ;  sell  vour  furniture.  Here,  I  have 
brought  you  twenty  guineas  ;  and  I'll  allow  you 
the  same  sum  every  year  as  long  as  you  live.' 
Fndeed,  my  opinion  of  Mr.  Nollekens  is  that,  had 
he  been  led  into  good  actions,  he  would  have  per- 
formed more  ;  and  it  is  only  to  be  lamented  that 
some  kind-hearted  individual  had  not  endeavoured 
to  make  him  understand  in  the  latter  part  of  his 
long  life,  when  he  had  heaped  up  such  immense 
sums,  that  he  should  have  recollected  his  poor 
cousins  at  Antwerp — if  they  were  his  cousins.  At 
all  events,  he  should  not  have  forgotten  the  near 
relations  of  his  wife  at  Aylesbury,  then  and  now 
declining  in  the  deepest  sorrow  and  aged  infirmity, 
either  within  the  walls  or  the  precincts  of  the 
workhouse. 

It  is,  however,  unaccountable  that,  at  the  very 
time  when  he  was  so  very  humane  to  poor  Richard- 
son, he  absolutely  suffered  his  own  uncle  and  aunt 
to  sell  their  beds  to  support  them  in  water-gruel  ; 
and  it  was  not  until  the  kind  interference  of  Mr. 
Saunders  Welch,  who  had,  with  his  daughter 
Anne,  seen  them  in  Paris,   that  he  allowed  them 


124  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

£30  a  year.  Their  melancholy  situation  has 
been  proved  by  several  letters  addressed  to  Mr. 
Nollekens,  and  lately  produced  before  the  Master 
in  Chancery  by  Mr.  Nelson  Beechey,  with  a  sight 
of  which  I  have  been  favoured  by  John  Stone, 
Esq.,  of  Southampton  Street,  Bloomsbury,  solicitor 
to  Mr.  Jasper  Peck,  one  of  Nollekens'  first  cousins, 
to  whom  he  had  left  some  very  trifling  remem- 
brances, considering  his  near  relationship  to  his 
own  mother.  To  the  Rev.  Mr.  Kenrick  Peck, 
another  of  his  first  cousins,  nothing  was  left,  and 
that  gentleman  has  several  children  dependent  on 
him  for  support. 

In  speaking  of  these  relations,  it  seems  proper 
that  I  should  now  lay  before  my  readers  some  little 
account  of  Saunders  Welch,  Esq.,  the  father  of 
Mrs.  Nollekens.  He  was  born  at  Aylesbury,  was 
educated  in  the  workhouse  of  that  town,  and  was 
apprenticed  to  one  of  the  most  popular  men  of  his 
day,  Mr.  Clements,  the  celebrated  trunk-maker,  at 
the  corner  of  St.  Paul's  Churchyard,  in  London. 
But  I  must  pass  him  on  to  manhood,  for  the 
want  of  intermediate  information,  with  which  his 
relative,  Mr.  Woodcock,  is  not  able  to  furnish 
me,  and  fix  him  in  trade,  for  he  was  manv  years 
a  grocer,  occupying  the  shop,  No.  1,  at  the 
south-west  corner  of  Museum  Street,  late  Queen 
Street. 

My  worthy  friend,  William  Packer,  Esq.,  of  Great 
Baddow,  in  Essex,  and  many  other  venerable  persons, 
recollect  seeing  him  as  High  Constable  of  West- 
minster, dressed  in  black,  with  a  large,  nine-story 


WILKES 


125 


George  II. 's  wig,  highly  powdered,  with  long  flow- 
ing curls  over  his  shoulders,  a  high  three-cornered 
hat,  and  his  black  baton  tipped  with  silver  at  either 
end,  riding  on  a  white  horse  to  Tyburn  with  the 
malefactors.  Mr.  Welch  was  a  member  of  the 
Beefsteak  Club,  when  founded  by  Mr.  Rich  and 
George  Lambert,  the  scene-painter,  with  whom  he 
was  intimate  ;  and  I  have  often  heard  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens  say  it  was  her  business  to  dress  up  for  him  a 
round  hat  with  ribbons,  similar  to  those  worn  by 
the  Yeomen  of  his  Majesty's  Guard,  which  the 
gentlemen  of  that  club  then  wore  ;  she  added,  too, 
that  her  father  was  so  loyal  a  man  that,  when 
Wilkes  was  admitted  a  member,  he  withdrew  him- 
self. 

My  friend,  the  late  Mr.  Thomas  Grignon,  of 
Russell  Street,  Co  vent  Garden,  informed  me  that  as 
Mr.  Wilkes  was  passing  the  house  in  which  he  then 
lived,  in  a  hackney-chair,  his  father  tapped  at  the 
window  to  him,  which  notice  Mr.  Wilkes  returned 
by  kissing  his  hand  ;  but  he  had  not  gone  three  yards 
before  he  ordered  one  of  the  chairmen  to  go  to  the 
gentleman  who  had  tapped  at  the  window,  and  inform 
him  that  he  wished  to  speak  with  him.  Mr.  Grignon 
immediately  went  to  him,  and  was  addressed  in 
nearly  the  following  manner :  4  Grignon,  you  are 
intimate  with  Sir  John  Fielding.  I  am  going  to 
him  upon  a  very  singular  business  ;  will  you 
accompany  me  ?'  '  Certainly,'  he  replied  ;  '  let  me 
fetch  my  hat.'  They  went,  and  Mr.  Wilkes,  to  the 
great  astonishment  of  his  friend,  addressed  the 
sitting  magistrate,  Mr.  Spinnage,  Sir  John  Fielding 


126  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 

being  absent,  to  this  effect :  l  Sir,  I  demand  a 
warrant  to  arrest  the  persons  of  the  Secretaries 
of  State,  by  whose  order  my  bureau,  desk,  and 
escritoire  have  been  broken  open,  and  all  my 
papers  seized !'  {  God  bless  me !'  said  Mr.  Grignon  ; 
'  Friend  Wilkes,  you  are  another  John.'  4  Whom 
do  you  mean  ?  John  Hampden  ?'  '  No  ;  John 
Lilburn,'  he  rejoined.  \  Well,  it's  all  one,''  observed 
Wilkes. 

Mr.  Spinnage,  however,  refused  to  grant  the 
warrant ;  and  Mr.  Wilkes,  after  persisting  in  his 
right,  and  threatening  the  magistrate,  went  to 
Justice  Welch,  who  smiled  at  his  threats  and  re- 
fused his  request.  It  must  here  be  observed  that 
Mr.  Grignon  was  not  aware  of  Mr.  Wilkes's  busi- 
ness or  intention  when  he  first  accompanied  him ; 
but,  as  he  was  a  most  liberal  man,  he  would  not 
desert  him  in  a  moment  of  difficulty.  My  friend 
Grignon  assured  me  that  his  father's  inadvertence 
deprived  him  of  many  of  his  best  customers  ;  though 
he  added  that  his  father  had  no  other  acquaintance 
with  Mr.  Wilkes  than  that  of  frequently  meeting 
him  at  the  Beefsteak  Club. 

Mr.  Henry  Fielding,  in  his  '  Journal  of  a  Voyage 
to  Lisbon,'  in  1754,  published  in  1755,  when  stating 
his  great  difficulty  of  moving  himself,  being  dread- 
fully afflicted  with  the  dropsy,  says :  '  By  the 
assistance  of  my  friend  Mr.  Welch,  whom  I  never 
think  or  speak  of  but  with  love  and  esteem,  I 
conquered  this  difficulty.'  This  was  when  he  was 
getting  into  the  vessel  at  Rotherhithe.  When  thev 
were  at  Gravesend,  Monday,  July  1,  he  says  :  '  This 


MRS.  HUSSEY  127 


day  Mr.  Welch  took  his  leave  of  me,  after  dinner.' 
Henry  Fielding  was  fond  of  colouring  his  pictures 
of  life  with  the  glowing  and  variegated  tints  of 
Nature,  by  conversing  with  persons  of  every  situa- 
tion and  calling,  as  I  have  frequently  been  informed 
by  one  of  my  great-aunts,  the  late  Mrs.  Hussey, 
who  knew  him  intimately.  I  have  heard  her  say 
that  Mr.  Fielding  never  suffered  his  talent  for 
sprightly  conversation  to  mildew  for  a  moment, 
and  that  his  manners  were  so  gentlemanly  that,  even 
with  the  lower  classes,  with  which  he  frequently 
condescended  particularly  to  chat,  such  as  Sir 
Ros;er  De  Coverlev's  old  friends,  the  Vauxhall 
watermen,  they  seldom  outstepped  the  limits  of 
propriety.  My  aunt,  who  lived  to  the  age  of  one 
hundred  and  five,  had  been  blessed  with  four 
husbands,  and  her  name  had  twice  been  changed 
to  that  of  Hussey  :  she  was  of  a  most  delightful 
disposition,  of  a  retentive  memory,  highly  enter- 
taining, and  liberally  communicative  ;  and  to  her 
I  have  frequently  been  obliged  for  an  interesting 
anecdote. 

She  was,  after  the  death  of  her  second  husband, 
Mr.  Hussey,  a  fashionable  sacque  and  mantua 
maker,  and  lived  in  the  Strand,  a  few  doors  west 
of  the  residence  of  the  celebrated  Le  Beck,  a  famous 
cook,  who  had  a  large  portrait  of  himself  for  the 
sign  of  his  house,  at  the  north-west  corner  of  Half- 
moon  Street,  since  called  Little  Bedford  Street. 
One  day  Mr.  Fielding  observed  to  Mrs.  Hussey 
that  he  was  then  engaged  in  writing  a  novel,  which 
he    thought   would    be   his    best   production,    and 


128  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

that  he  intended  to  introduce  in  it  the  characters 
of  all  his  friends.  Mrs.  Hussey,  with  a  smile, 
ventured  to  remark  that  he  must  have  many  niches, 
and  that  surely  they  must  already  be  filled.  c  I 
assure  you,  my  dear  madam,'  replied  he,  '  there 
shall  be  a  bracket  for  a  bust  of  you.'  Some  time 
after  this  he  informed  Mrs.  Hussey  that  the  work 
was  in  the  press  ;  but,  immediately  recollecting 
that  he  had  forgotten  his  promise  to  her,  went  to 
the  printer,  and  was  time  enough  to  insert  in 
vol.  iii.,  p.  17,  where  he  speaks  of  the  shape  of 
Sophia  Western  : 

c  Such  charms  are  there  in  affability,  and  so  sure 
it  is  to  attract  the  praises  of  all  kinds  of  people. 
It  may,  indeed,  be  compared  to  the  celebrated 
Mrs.  Hussey.'  To  which  observation  he  has  given 
the  following  note  :  c  A  celebrated  mantua-maker 
in  the  Strand,  famous  for  setting  off  the  shapes  of 
women.' 

Mr.  Boswell  states  that  Dr.  Johnson  maintained 
a  long  and  intimate  friendship  with  Mr.  Welch, 
who  succeeded  Fielding  as  one  of  his  Majesty's 
Justices  of  the  Peace  for  Westminster,  and  kept 
a  regular  office  for  the  police  of  that  district.  The 
Doctor  begins  a  letter  addressed  to  Saunders  Welch, 
Esq.,  at  the  English  Coffee-house,  Rome,  dated 
February  3,  1778  : 

1  Dear  Sir, 

'  To  have  suffered  one  of  my  best  and  dearest  friends  to  pass 
almost  two  years  in  foreign  countries  without  a  letter  has  a  very 
shameful  appearance  of  inattention.  But  the  truth  is  that  there  was 
no  particular  time  in  which  I  had  anything  particular  to  say  ;  and 


THE  WELCHES  129 


general  expressions  of  goodwill,  I  hope,  our  long  friendship  is  grown 
too  solid  to  want.' 

The  Doctor,  speaking  of  Miss  Welch  in  another 
part  of  the  same  letter,  notices  that  lady  thus  : 
1  Miss  Nancy  has  doubtless  kept  a  constant  and 
copious  journal.'  It  was  not,  however,  towards 
Miss  Welch  that  the  Doctor  had  serious  thoughts, 
but  of  her  sister  Mary;  and  I  have  heard  Mr. 
Nollekens  say  that  the  Doctor,  when  joked  about 
her,  observed :  4  Yes,  I  think  Mary  would  have 
been  mine,  if  little  Joe  had  not  stepped  in.'  I 
must  now,  in  order  of  time,  state  that  Death  spread 
his  mantle  over  the  family,  and  that  everyone 
grieved  for  the  loss  of  Mr.  Welch,  who  died  at 
Taunton  Dean,  in  the  county  of  Somerset.  Upon  a 
mural  monument  erected  within  the  porch  over  the 
centre  entrance  of  the  Parish  Church  of  St.  George, 
Bloomsbury,  is  engraven  the  following  inscription, 
written  by  Sir  John  Hawkins,  Knight,  father  of 
John  Sidney  Hawkins,  Esq.,  one  of  the  editors  of 
4  Ignoramus,'  Henry  Hawkins,  Esq.,  and  Matilda 
Letitia  Hawkins,  with  whose  writings  the  public  is 
well  acquainted  : 

1  In  the  cemetery  belonging  to  this  Church  lie  the  remains  of 
Saunders  Welch,  Esq.,  late  of  this  Parish,  one  of  his  Majesty's  Justices 
of  the  Peace  for  the  Counties  of  Middlesex,  Surrey,  and  Buckingham, 
and  for  the  City  and  Liberties  of  Westminster.  He  was  born  and 
educated  at  Aylesbury,  in  the  County  of  Buckingham,  and  married 
Mary,  the  daughter  of  Will.  Brotherton,  Gent.,  by  whom  he  had  issue 
two  surviving  daughters,  Maria  and  Ann.  He  departed  this  life 
31st  day  of  October,  1784,  in  the  74th  year  of  his  age. 

1  As  long  as  Themis  with  impartial  hand 
Her  blessings  shall  disperse  throughout  this  land  ; 

9 


i3o  KOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Or  lenient  statutes,  or  vindictive  law, 
Protect  the  good,  or  hold  the  bad  in  awe ; 
Or  Mercy,  blending  Grace  with  Justice,  shed 
Her  milder  beams  on  the  delinquent  head  ; 
While  Probity  and  Truth  shall  be  rever'd, 
And  legal  power  as  much  belov'd  as  fear'd, 
So  long  shall  fame  to  each  succeeding  day 
Thy  virtues  witness  and  thy  worth  display.' 

Mr.  Welch,  in  his  will,  dated  December  10,  1775, 
left  his  daughters  Mary  and  Anne  equal  propor- 
tions of  his  leasehold  estates  ;  but  nearly  all  his 
movables  he  bequeathed  to  Anne,  for  her  tenderness 
towards  him  in  his  decline  of  life.  Tillotson's 
'  Sermons,'  etc.,  fell  to  the  lot  of  Mary.  To  Sir 
John  Hawkins  he  left  five  guineas  ;  to  his  son-in- 
law  Nollekens  he  left  fifteen  guineas,  to  be  laid  out 
in  a  set  of  silver  castors  ;  and  to  his  steadfast  friend 
Samuel  Johnson,  LL.D.,  whose  memory  must  ever 
be  revered,  he  left  five  guineas,  which,  says  the  enter- 
taining Boswell,  the  Doctor  '  received  with  tender- 
ness as  a  kind  memorial.'  Mr.  Welch's  will  has  all 
the  appearance  of  being  genuine,  and  the  greatest 
mass  of  the  testator's  property  very  properly  de- 
volved to  his  daughters.  Indeed,  Mr.  Welch  was  of 
such  sound  sense  that  no  one  dared  to  direct  his 
conduct,  or  even  to  delude  him  by  flattery  or 
presents. 

Whenever  Mrs.  Xollekens  related  any  anecdote 
of  her  father,  she  always  elevated  her  person  by 
standing  upon  her  toes  at  the  conclusion  of  every 
extraordinary  mark  of  his  benevolence,  courage,  or 
sensible  magisterial  decision. 

Mrs.  Nollekens  often  spake  of  his  going,  in  1766, 


SAUNDERS  WELCH  131 

into  Cranbourne  Alley  unattended,  to  quell  the  daily 
meeting  of  the  journeymen  shoemakers,  who  had 
struck  for  an  increase  of  wages.  Immediately  her 
father  made  his  appearance  he  was  recognised,  and 
his  name  shouted  up  and  down  the  alley,  not  with 
fear,  but  with  a  degree  of  exultation.  '  Well,'  said 
the  ringleader,  '  let  us  get  him  a  beer-barrel  and 
mount  him  ;'  and  when  I13  was  up,  they  one  and 
all  gave  him  three  cheers,  and  cried :  4  Welch  ! 
Welch  for  ever  V  In  the  mildest  manner  possible, 
Mr.  Welch  assured  them  that  he  was  glad  to  find 
they  had  conducted  themselves  quietly  ;  and  at  the 
same  time,  in  the  most  forcible  terms,  persuaded 
them  to  disperse,  as  their  meetings  were  illegal. 
He  also  observed  to  the  master  shoemakers,  who 
were  listening  to  him  from  the  first-floor  windows, 
that  as  they  had  raised  the  prices  of  shoes  on 
account  of  the  increased  value  of  provisions,  they 
should  consider  that  the  families  of  their  work- 
men had  proportionate  wants.  The  result  was 
that  the  spokesmen  of  their  trade  were  called  into 
the  shops,  and  an  additional  allowance  was  agreed 
upon. 

The  men  then  alternately  carried  Mr.  Welch  on 
their  shoulders  to  his  office  in  Litchfield  Street,  gave 
him  three  cheers  more,  and  set  him  down.  Welch 
was  a  tall  man,  and  when  in  the  prime  of  life  robust 
and  powerful.  But  though  his  benevolence  was 
unbounded  in  cases  of  distress,  yet  whenever  neces- 
sity urged  him  to  firmness,  he  was  bold  and  resolute, 
as  may  be  seen  by  the  following  anecdote : 

When  the  streets  were  entirely  paved  with  pebble- 


1 32  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

stones  up  to  the  houses,  hacknevmen  could  drive 
their  coaches  close  to  the  very  doors.  It  hap- 
pened that  Mr.  Welch  had  good  information  that  a 
notorious  offender,  who  had  for  some  time  annoyed 
the  Londoners  in  their  walks  through  the  green 
lanes  to  Marylebone,  and  who  had  eluded  the  chase 
of  several  of  his  men,  was  in  a  first-floor  of  a  house 
in  Eose  Street,  Long  Acre.  After  hiring  the 
tallest  hackney-coach  he  could  select,  he  mounted 
the  box  with  the  coachman,  and  when  he  was  close 
against  the  house  he  ascended  the  roof  of  the 
coach,  threw  up  the  sash  of  a  first-floor  window, 
entered  the  room,  and  actually  dragged  the  fellow 
from  his  bed  out  at  the  window  by  his  hair,  naked 
as  he  was,  upon  the  roof  of  the  coach,  and  in  that 
way  carried  the  terror  of  the  green  lanes  down 
New  Street  and  up  St.  Martin's  Lane,  amidst  the 
huzzas  of  an  immense  throng,  which  followed  him 
to  Litchfield  Street. 

Sir  John  Fielding  took  cognizance  of  those 
offenders  who  were  nearest  Bow  Street,  such,  for 
instance,  as  the  inhabitants  of  Lewkner's  Lane, 
Vinegar  Yard,  and  Short's  Gardens  ;  but  more 
particularly  that  most  popular  of  all  gardens — I 
mean  that  which  is  within  and  in  the  middle  of 
St.  Paul's  parish,  which  garden  became  infamous 
when  its  splendid  inhabitants  exchanged  their  resi- 
dences for  the  newly-built  mansions  in  Hanover, 
Grosvenor,  and  Cavendish  Squares,  and  Holies  and 
the  other  streets  adjacent.  It  was  at  that  period 
that  Mother  Needham,  Mother  Douglass  (alias, 
according  to    Foote's  '  Minor,'  Mother  Cole),  and 


SAUNDERS  WELCH  133 

Moll  King,  the  tavern-keepers,  and  the  gamblers, 
took  possession  of  the  abdicated  premises  ;  so  that 
Sir  John  Fielding  was  in  the  hotbed  of  the  three 
principal  of  all  the  vices. 

Saunders  Welch's  attention  was  for  the  most  part 
confined  to  the  abandoned  women  and  pickpockets 
who  frequented  Hedge  Lane,  the  Haymarket,  Cran- 
bourne  Alley,  and  Leicester  Fields,  the  last  of 
which,  from  the  rough  and  broken  state  of  its 
ground,  and  the  shadow  of  a  lofty  row  of  elms 
which  then  stood  in  the  road  in  front  of  most  of 
the  houses  on  the  eastern  side,  was  rendered  a  very 
dangerous  part  to  pass,  particularly  before  the 
streets  were  paved  and  publicly  lighted. 

In  addition  to  these,  Mr.  Welch  had  visitors 
among  the  frequenters  of  Marylebone  Gardens,  the 
highwaymen  who  committed  nightly  depredations 
in  the  adjacent  lanes,  the  pickpockets  who  attended 
Whitfield's  Meeting  House  in  Long  Acre,  and  the 
thousands  of  his  Sunday  friends  who  congregated 
in  Marylebone  Fields  before  the  new  road  was 
made  from  Paddington  to  Islington  ;  when  the 
public  newspapers  announced  an  inhabitant  of  the 
city  to  have  arrived  safely  at  his  house  in  Mary- 
lebone !  It  was  the  practice  of  Mr.  Whitfield, 
before  his  chapel  in  Tottenham  Court  Road  was 
finished  in  1759,  to  preach  of  a  Sunday  evening  in 
these  fields  ;  and  I  have  been  credibly  informed  by 
William  Packer,  Esq.,  a  gentleman  now  living  in 
his  ninetieth  year,  that  he  was  there  when  it  was 
supposed  50,000  persons  were  present,  so  much 
were    the    Marylebone    fields    frequented   by   the 


134  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Londoners  on  a  fine  summer  evening,  and  so  great 
was  the  popularity  of  the  preacher.  Mr.  Welch 
also  derived  no  small  share  of  business  from  the 
depredators  who  attended  the  executions  at  Tyburn. 
His  office  on  those  mornings,  as  well  as  Fielding's, 
was  thronged  by  gentlemen  who  had  lost  their 
watches  and  pocket-books,  or  ladies  who  had  been 
robbed  of  their  velvet  cardinals  or  purses. 

Dr.  Johnson  soon  followed  his  friend  Welch  to 
the  grave,  as  he  died  on  Monday,  December  IS, 
1784,  in  the  back  room  of  the  first-floor  of  his 
house  in  Bolt  Court,  Fleet  Street,  of  which  room  I 
made  a  drawing  just  before  Mr.  Bensley,  the 
printer,  pulled  that  part  of  the  house  down  to  make 
wav  for  a  staircase.1 

As  few  persons  are  aware  of  the  following  anec- 
dote, I  am  sure  that  the  curious  reader  will  pardon 
my  inserting  it  :  Whilst  I  was  assisting  Mrs.  Maria 
Cosway2  with  my  advice  as  to  disposing  of  the 
collection  of  her  late  husband,  and  thus  putting 
some  thousands  of  pounds  in  her  purse,  I  was  one 
morning  agreeably  surprised  by  a  letter  which  she 
put  into  my  hand,  wrritten  by  W.  Hoper,  Esq., 
giving  me  permission  to  make  a  drawing  of  Dr. 
Johnson's  silver  teapot  in  his  possession,  an  article 
which  had  been  described  to  me  by  W.  V.  Hellyer, 

1  There  is  not  a  vestige  of  the  original  house  now  remaining. — 
Smith. 

2  Mary  Cecilia  Louisa  Cosway,  whose  maiden  name  was  Hadfield, 
married  Richard  Cosway,  R.A.,  in  1781.  She  was  herself  a  painter 
and  a  person  of  the  highest  eccentricity.  She  became  the  lady  superior 
of  a  religious  house  at  Lyons,  after  running  away  from  her  husband. 
—Ed. 


DR.  JOHNSON'S  TEA-POT  135 

Esq.,  of  the  Middle  Temple,  through  whose  kind- 
ness the  owner  had  sent  it  to  his  friend,  Mrs. 
Cos  way,  first  for  me  to  have  tea  from,  and  then 
to  draw  it,  both  of  which  I  did  with  no  little 
delight. 

Upon  the  side  of  this  teapot  the  following  in- 
scription is  engraven  : 

'  We  are  told  by  Lucian  that  the  earthern  lamp  which  had  adminis- 
tered to  the  lucubrations  of  Epictetus  was,  at  his  death,  purchased 
for  the  enormous  sum  of  three  thousand  drachmas  :  why,  then,  may 
not  imagination  equally  amplify  the  value  of  this  unadorned  vessel, 
long  employed  for  the  infusion  of  that  favourite  herb  whose  enliven- 
ing virtues  are  said  to  have  so  often  protracted  the  elegant  and 
edifying  lucubrations  of  Samuel  Johnson,  the  zealous  advocate  of 
that  innocent  beverage,  against  its  declared  enemy,  Jonas  Hanway. 
It  was  weighed  out  for  sale  under  the  inspection  of  Sir  John  Hawkins, 
at  the  very  minute  when  they  were  in  the  next  room  closing  the 
incision  through  which  Mr.  Cruickshank  had  explored  the  ruinated 
machinery  of  its  dead  master's  thorax — so  Bray,  the  silversmith,  con- 
veyed there  in  Sir  John's  carriage  thus  hastily  to  buy  the  plate, 
informed  its  present  possessor,  Henry  Constantine  Nowell,  by  whom 
it  was,  for  its  celebrated  services,  on  November  1,  1788,  rescued  from 
the  undiscriminating  obliterations  of  the  furnace.' 

The  ensuing  is  an  answer  to  one  of  my  inter- 
rogatory epistles,  affording  me  another  opportunity 
of  recording  the  fate  of  two  other  articles  which 
had  been  the  property  of  the  late  Dr.  Johnson,  and 
as  it  was  received  from  my  friend,  the  Rev.  Hugh 
Bailye,  Canon  of  Lichfield,  I  shall  print  it  with  a 
double  gratification  : 

*  Lichfield,  May  1,  1821. 
4  Dear  Sir, 

'  I  certainly  am  in  possession  of  the  late  Dr.  Johnson's  watch, 
which  I  purchased  from  his  black  servant,  Francis  Barber  {vide 
Boswell's   "  Life "   for  an  account  of   this  watch).      Dr.   Johnson's 


136  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


punch-bowl  is  likewise  in  my  possession,  and  was  purchased  by  the 
Rev.  Thomas  Harwood,  the  historian  of  Lichfield.  It  was  bought  at 
Mr.  Harwood's  sale  by  John  Barker  Scott,  Esq.,  banker,  who  after- 
wards presented  it  to  me. 

'  I  am,  dear  sir, 

1  Yours  faithfully, 

'  Hugh  Bailye. 
'  To  John  Thomas  Smith, 
Keeper  of  the  Prints  in  the  British  Museum.' 

In  vol.  xxiv.,  p.  72,  of  Cole's  MSS.  in  the  British 
Museum,  the  reader  will  find  a  copy  of  a  letter 
addressed  to  Mr.  Cole  bv  George  Steevens,  dated 
May  14,  1782,  and  as  it  will  afford  the  collector  of 
the  various  portraits  of  Dr.  Johnson  a  notice  of  one 
little  known,  I  have  here  inserted  it  : 

'  As  some  return  for  the  portrait  of  Mr.  Gray,  and  the  specimen  of 
his  handwriting,  I  present  you  with  the  original  sketch  Dr.  Johnson 
made  for  his  "  Life  of  Pope."  Be  not  angry  when  you  find  that  the 
same  parcel  includes  his  "  Deformities,"  a  Scottish  pamphlet,  written 
by  a  club  of  Caledonian  wits.  Every  bookseller  of  credit  in  London 
has  refused  to  sell  it.  The  Doctor  (who,  by-the-by,  is  very  ill,  and 
I  have  many  fears  about  him)  laughs  at  such  ribaldry,  and  offered,  by 
way  of  frontispiece  to  it,  a  very  ugly  head  of  himself,  which  was 
meant  to  have  been  prefixed  to  his  "  Beauties,"  but  was  cancelled  at 
my  desire.' 

Mr.  Welch,  who  was  never  happier  than  when 
he  was  rendering  assistance  to  those  among  his 
numerous  friends  who  stood  in  need  of  it,  once 
kindly  blamed  Wilson,  the  landscape-painter,  when 
he  found  him  in  a  dejected  state.  '  You  never  come 
to  dine  with  me  now,'  said  he,  c  though  you  used  to 
partake  of  my  round  of  beef,  and  I  am  sure  we 
have  had  many  pleasant  hours  together.'  Poor 
Wilson,  who  had  existed  for  some  time  without 
selling  a  picture,  regretted  that  Mr.  Welch  was  not 


RICHARD  WILSON  137 


a  collector  of  paintings.  c  I  certainly  do  not  under- 
stand them,  my  good  fellow,'  said  he  ;  '  however, 
if  you  will  dine  with  me  next  Monday  week,  I 
will  then  hespeak  a  fifteen-guinea  picture  of  you.' 
Wilson  pronounced  him  to  be  a  noble  creature,  and, 
taking  him  by  the  hand,  added :  *  Heaven  knows 
where  I  may  be  by  that  time.'  Mr.  Welch  then 
asked  him  :  '  Are  you  engaged  to-morrow  ?'  4  No,' 
replied  he.  '  Well,  then,'  returned  his  friend,  '  if 
you  will  send  a  picture  to  my  house,  and  join  me  at 
dinner,  I  will  pay  you  the  money.' 

What  person  possessing  the  feelings  of  an  English 
artist  can  hear  the  name  of  Wilson  mentioned  with- 
out secretly  exulting  that  he  was  a  native  of  our 
envied  island  ?  And  those  who  have  perused  the 
works  of  Dr.  Wolcot  must  have  been  pleased  at  the 
homage  which  even  that  sarcastic  genius  paid  to 
'  Red-nosed  Dick.'  With  my  humble  share  of  know- 
ledge in  painting,  I  must,  without  fear  of  depriving 
either  Turner,  Callcott,  or  Arnald  of  one  jot  of  their 
high  celebrity,  affirm  that  Wilson  was  a  leviathan 
in  his  profession  ;  and  this  also  was  the  opinion  of 
a  skilful  practitioner  and  one  of  the  first  judges  of 
art — I  allude  to  the  ever-to-be-lamented  Sir  George 
Beaumont,  Bart.,  who  is  deservedly  entitled  to  the 
wreath  of  everlasting  honour  for  presenting  so 
choice  a  collection  of  pictures  to  our  glorious 
National  Gallery. 

Mr.  Welch,  in  the  course  of  a  few  months,  re- 
peated to  Wilson  the  proposition  of  sporting  a 
round  of  beef  and  of  making  another  fifteen-guinea 
purchase  ;  and  in  this  manner  he  became  possessed 


138  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

of  the  two  beautiful  pictures  which  descended  to 
Mr.  Nollekens,  of  which  some  further  particulars 
w^ill  be  found  in  another  part  of  this  work.  As  to 
the  picture  of  Dover  Castle,  which  Mr.  Nollekens 
also  possessed,  Mr.  Welch  purchased  it  at  a  furni- 
ture sale,  by  Wilson's  recommendation,  assuring 
him  that  it  was  the  best  picture  he  had  ever  painted. 
The  town  residence  of  that  excellent  connoisseur, 
Richard  Ford,  Esq.,  boasts  a  most  splendid  collec- 
tion of  Wilson's  pictures  in  every  variety  of  his 
manner.  This  incomparable  assemblage,  which 
consists  of  nearly  fifty  specimens,  had  been  the 
property  of  Lady  Ford,  his  mother,  who,  upon  his 
marriage,  most  liberally  presented  them  to  him  ; 
her  ladyship  became  possessed  of  them  at  the 
death  of  her  father.  The  same  gentleman  has 
also  many  of  Wilson's  finest  drawings  from  nature, 
which  he  principally  made  when  studying  at  Rome, 
one  of  wdiich  is  particularly  interesting,  since  it 
contains  Wilson's  own  figure,  seated  on  the  ground 
in  his  bag-wig,  making  a  drawing  of  Raffaelle's 
villa. 

The  late  Paul  Sanclby,1  Esq.,  once  showed  me  a 
fine  collection  of  Wilson's  drawings,  to  which  he 
attached  the  following  anecdote  :  Wilson,  well 
knowing  the  frequent  intercourse  Mr.  Sandby  had 
with  some  of  the  highest  persons  in  the  country, 
solicited  him  to  show  a  portfolio  of  his  drawings  to 
his  pupils.  Paul  Sandby,  with  his  usual  liberality, 
did  so,  and  spake  highly  in  their  favour  ;  but  found 

1  Paul   Sandby  (1725-1809),  the   father  of  English  water-colour 
painting. — Ed. 


RICHARD  WILSON  139 

that  the  amateurs,  or  gentlemen  draughtsmen,  pre- 
ferred highly-finished  drawings  to  mere  sketches, 
and  finding  his  repeated  attempts  to  serve  his  old 
friend  Wilson  fruitless,  was  induced  to  make  the 
purchase  himself,  without  allowing  him  to  know 
that  he  had  been  unsuccessful  in  his  applications. 


[  HO  ] 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Interview  between  Mr.  Nollekens  and  Nathaniel  Hone — Hone's 
satirical  picture  on  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  and  Angelica  Kauffmann 
— Account  of  Hone's  exhibition  of  it,  with  extracts  from  his  state- 
ment— Other  notices  of  Hone  and  his  pictures — Short  stature  of 
Garrick  and  Nollekens — Anecdote  by  Mrs.  Garrick  of  Dance's 
picture  of  her  husband  as  Richard  III. — Mrs.  Nollekens'  dog — 
Sagacity  of  that  of  Mrs.  Garrick— Norman  the  dog-doctor — Mrs. 
Radcliffe's  dogs. 

One  day 1  Daphne,  the  dog,  announced  the  approach 
of  a  stranger  in  the  yard,  and  a  tall,  upright,  large 
man,  with  a  broad-brimmed  hat,  and  a  lapelled  coat 
buttoned  up  to  his  stock,  with  measured  and  stately 
steps  entered  the  studio,  walked  up  to  Mr.  Nolle- 
kens, who  was  then  modelling  a  bust  of  Sir  Charles 
Eyre  Coote,  and,  full  of  self-importance,  saluted 
him  with  '  Joseph  Nollekens,  Esquire,  K.A.,  how 
do  you  do  ?' 

Nollekens,  who  never  liked  him,  answered, '  Well, 
now,  I  suppose,  you're  come  to  get  me  to  join  you 
in  the  Academy  to-night  against  Sir  Joshua,  but 
you're  very  much  mistaken  ;  and  I  can  tell  you 
more,  I  never  will  join  you  in  anything  you  propose. 
You're  always  running  your  rigs  against  Sir  Joshua  ; 
and  you  may  say  what  you  please,  but  I  have  never 

1  It  must  have  been  in  1775. — Ed. 


NATHANIEL  HONE  141 

had  any  opinion  of  you  ever  since  you  painted  that 
picture  of  the  "  Conjurer,"  as  you  called  it.  I  don't 
wonder  they  turned  it  out  of  the  Academy.  And 
pray,  what  business  had  you  to  bring  Angelica  into 
it  ?  You  know  it  was  your  intention  to  ridicule 
her,  whatever  you  or  your  printed  paper  and  your 
affidavits  may  say  ;  however,  you  may  depend  upon 
it,  she  won't  forget  it,  if  Sir  Joshua  does.' 

The  visitor,  who  proved  to  be  no  other  than 
Nathaniel  Hone,1  the  enamel-painter,  replied,  c  Why, 
now,  how  can  you  be  so  ill-tempered  this  morning  ? 
I  have  brought  you  two  prints  which  I  bought  in  a 
lot  at  old  Gerard's.'  Nollekens :  'Well,  I  don't 
care  ;  you  don't  bribe  me  in  that  way  ;  I  know 
what  you  are  going  to  do  to-night,  and  I'll  vote 
against  you,  so  you  may  take  your  prints  back 
again.' 

Hone :  c  Why,  one  of  them  is  by  Captain  Baillie, 
one  of  the  Commissioners  of  the  Stamp  Office.' 

Nollekens :  '  Ay,  he's  another  swaggering  fellow, 
too  ;  he  was  praising  the  print  you  have  engraved 
in  mezzotinto,  of  Grose  and  Forrest,  from  another 
picture  that  did  you  no  good.  It  proves  you  to  be 
a  man  of  no  religion,  or  you  would  not  sport  with 
the  Roman  Catholics  in  that  way.'  Here  the  dialogue 
ended,  by  Hone  wishing  Joseph  Nollekens,  Esquire, 
R.A.,  a  good  morning. 

As  few  people  now  living  are  aware  of  the  par- 
ticulars of  Hone's  attack  upon  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds, 
I  shall  here  insert  some  extracts  from  a  paper  which 

1  He  was  born  in  Dublin  in  1718,  was  a  foundation  member  of  the 
Royal  Academy,  and  died  in  1784. — Ed. 


142  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


had  been  industriously  distributed  by  Hone  among 
those  persons  who  he  thought  were  most  likely  to 
take  part  with  him  in  the  abuse  of  the  honourable 
President ;  but  before  I  introduce  them,  the  reader 
should  be  apprised  of  the  following  particulars : 
Mr.  Hone,  who  had  been  a  fashionable  miniature- 
painter  in  enamel,  commenced  oil-painting  upon  a 
large  scale  ;  but  in  that  branch  of  the  art  he  was 
not  so  successful  as  in  the  former.  Indeed,  he 
found  Reynolds  carry  away  the  principal  patronage, 
which  rendered  him  so  jealous  that  he  took  every 
opportunity  of  endeavouring  to  defame  him.  And 
well  knowing  that  Sir  Joshua  had  borrowed  the 
attitudes  of  some  of  his  portraits  from  those  of 
Vandyke,  etc.,  he  painted  a  picture  of  an  old  man 
in  a  gown,  holding  a  wand  in  his  hand,  in  the  act  of 
commanding  the  very  engravings  which  he  affirmed 
Sir  Joshua  had  used,  to  rise  out  of  the  flames,  which 
picture  Hone  called  the  c  Conjurer.'  There  was  at 
first  some  indelicacy  which  he  had  introduced  in 
the  centre  of  the  picture,  but  which  he  afterwards 
painted  out,  respecting  a  slanderous  report  which 
had  been  whispered  as  to  Sir  Joshua  and  Angelica 
Kauffmann. 

This  picture  of  the  '  Conjurer '  being  considered 
by  the  members  of  the  Royal  Academy  as  a  most 
malicious  satire  upon  their  President,  they  very 
honourably  agreed  in  Council  that  it  should  not 
be  exhibited  by  them  ;  upon  which  decision  Mr. 
Hone,  as  the  picture  had  been  the  subject  of  much 
conversation,  determined  upon  having  an  exhibition 
of  his  own  works,  consisting  of  sixty-six  in  number, 


NATHANIEL  HONE  143 

in  which  the  rejected  one  of  the  '  Conjurer '  held  the 
most  conspicuous  place.  The  room  in  which  they 
were  exhibited  is  now  a. workshop  behind  the  house 
of  Messrs.  Mouchett  and  Wild,  No.  70,  St.  Martin's 
Lane,  opposite  to  Old  Slaughter's  Coffee-house. 
Upon  my  questioning  the  late  Associate,  Mr.  Horace 
Hone,  upon  this  transaction  of  his  father,  he  favoured 
me  with  a  sight  of  the  original  catalogue  ;  and  as 
it  is  now  considered  the  Greatest  rarity  in  the 
Academic  annals,  I  insert  the  following  extracts 
from  it : 

'Many  false  reports  having  been  spread  relating  to  a  picture  called 
the  "Conjurer,"  painted  by  Mr.  Hone,  and  offered  to  the  Royal 
Academy  Exhibition  this  season,  he  is  advised  by  some  very  respect- 
able friends  to  give  a  short  statement  of  facts  to  the  public,  which  he 
hopes  will  clear  his  character  from  the  malicious  aspersions  attempted 
to  be  fixed  on  him,  as  well  as  excuse  him  from  the  presumption  of 
making  an  exhibition  singly  of  his  own  works. 

'  After  the  picture  in  question  had  remained  several  days,  and  was 
actually  hung  up  in  the  Royal  Academy  Exhibition,  Sir  William 
Chambers,  with  another  gentleman  of  the  Council  of  the  Academy, 
came  to  Mr.  Hone  at  his  house,  and  informed  him  that  it  had  been 
rumoured  that  he  had  made  an  indecent  figure  or  caricature  of  an 
eminent  female  artist,  and  that  they  should  be  sorry  such  an  indelicacy 
should  be  offered  to  the  public,  or  words  to  this  purpose.  Mr.  Hone 
was  greatly  surprised  at  the  accusation,  and  assured  the  gentlemen 
that  he  had  always  had  the  highest  esteem  for  the  lady  alluded  to, 
both  on  account  of  her  reputation  as  an  artist,  as  well  as  for  her  other 
accomplishments  ;  and  that,  to  remove  the  possibility  of  such  a  sus- 
picion, he  would  alter  any  figure  she  or  they  chose  the  very  next  day, 
or  before  the  exhibition  ;  and  that  he  did  not  intend  to  represent  any 
female  figure  in  that  picture,  except  the  child  leaning  on  the  conjuror's 
knee,  and  hoped  they  would  do  him  the  justice  to  remove  any  pre- 
judice the  lady  might  have.  The  next  morning  two  more  gentlemen 
of  the  Council  (with  that  other  gentleman  who  had  been  the  night 
before  with  Sir  William)  called  upon  Mr.  Hone,  who  were  all  of  them 
so  obliging  to  do  him  the  justice  to  say  they  had  carefully  looked  at 
the  figures,  and  would  clear  him  of  the  supposition  of  there  being  any 


i44  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

woman  figure,  that  they  were  well  assured  they  were  intended  to  mean 
the  contrary  sex.  Mr.  Hone  assured  them,  as  before,  of  his  respect 
for  the  lady ;  nor  did  he  trust  to  this  alone,  but  went  himself  twice 
that  day  to  wait  on  the  fair  artist  to  convince  her  of  the  error,  but 
was  refused  admittance.  He  thereupon  sent  a  letter  by  his  son,  who 
delivered  it  into  her  own  hands,  and  whereof  the  following  is  an 
exact  copy  : 

'"Pall  Mall,  Aprill%  1775. 
* "  Madam, 

' "  The  evening  before  last  I  was  not  a  little  surprised  at  a 
deputation  (as  I  take  it)  from  the  Council  of  our  Academy,  acquaint- 
ing me  that  you  was  most  prodigiously  displeased  at  my  making  a 
naked  Academy  figure  in  my  picture  of  the  *  Conjurer,'  now  at  the 
Royal  Academy,  representing  your  person.  I  immediately  perceived 
that  some  busy  meddler,  to  say  no  worse  a  name,  had  imposed  this 
extravagant  lie  (of  whose  making  God  knows)  upon  your  under- 
standing. To  convince  you,  madam,  that  your  figure  in  that  composi- 
tion was  the  farthest  from  my  thoughts,  I  now  declare  I  never  at  any 
time  saw  your  works  but  with  the  greatest  pleasure,  and  that  respect 
due  to  a  lady  whom  I  esteem  as  the  first  of  her  sex  in  painting,  and 
amongst  the  loveliest  of  women  in  person.  Envy  and  detraction  must 
have  worked  strangely,  for  yesterday  morning  some  more  gentlemen 
from  the  Academy  assured  me  that  your  uneasiness  was  very  great. 
I  assured  them  I  would  so  far  alter  the  figure  that  it  would  be 
impossible  to  suppose  it  to  be  a  woman,  though  they  cleared  me  of 
such  a  supposition  themselves,  as  they  understood  it  to  be  but  a  male 
figure,  and  that  I  would  put  a  beard  to  it,  or  even  dress  it  to  satisfy 
you  and  them.  I  did  myself  the  honour  of  calling  at  your  house  twice 
yesterday  (when  I  had  the  misfortune  not  to  meet  you  at  home) 
purposely  to  convince  you  how  much  you  have  been  imposed  upon,  as 
you  will  perceive  when  you  see  the  picture  yourself,  and  likewise  to 
convince  you  with  how  much  respect, 

'"lam,  madam, 
'  "  Your  most  obedient  and  most  humble  servant, 

' "  Nathaniel  Hone. 
1 "  To  Mrs.  Angelica  Kauffmann." 

1  To  which  the  day  following  this  answer  was  returned  :  # 

'"Sir, 

' "  I  should  have  answered  yours  immediately,  but  I  was 
engaged  in  business.     I  cannot  conceive  why  several  gentlemen,  who 


NATHANIEL  HONE  145 


never  before  deceived  me,  should  conspire  to  do  it  at  this  time  ;  and 
if  they  themselves  were  deceived,  you  cannot  wonder  that  others 
should  be  deceived  also,  and  take  for  satire  that  which  you  say  was 
not  intended.  I  was  actuated,  not  only  by  my  particular  feelings,  but 
a  respect  for  the  arts  and  artists,  and  persuade  myself  you  cannot 
think  it  a  great  sacrifice  to  remove  a  picture  that  had  even  raised  sus- 
picion of  disrespect  to  any  person  who  never  wished  to  offend  you. 
•  "  I  am,  sir, 

1 "  Your  humble  servant, 

' "  Angelica  Kauffman. 
'  "  To  Nathaniel  Hone,  Esq., 
Pall  Mall." 

'Mr.  Hone  was  exceedingly  hurt  to  find  the  lady's  prejudices  were 
so  strong  that  she  was  averse  to  being  convinced,  and  would  not  trust 
her  own  senses  to  be  undeceived.  So  forcibly  had  malice  and  detraction 
wrought  the  mischief  that  a  whole  city  was  to  laugh  at  the  imposition, 
whilst  a  party  concerned  was  resolved  to  remain  obstinate  in  error, 
and  oppose  the  most  condescending  offer  that  could  be  thought  of  to 
break  the  spell  that  Mr.  Hone's  enemies  ensnared  her  in.  However, 
other  motives  worked  the  concluding  part,  though  this  was  to  be  the 
ostensible  reason  for  the  extraordinary  conduct  of  rejecting  the  works 
of  an  Academician  honoured  by  his  Majesty's  sign-manual,  and  whose 
character  had  been  hitherto  unimpeached  by  the  breath  of  slander 
during  a  residence  in  this  capital  of  upwards  of  thirty  years. 

'  He  was  still  in  hopes  that  all  ill-grounded  prejudices  would  be 
dispersed  ;  but  how  was  he  disappointed  in  his  prospects  when,  to  his 
astonishment,  he  received  the  following  letter  from  the  Secretary  of 
the  Academy  ! 

"  Exhibition  Room,  Pall  Mall, 
Tuesday  evening,  9  o'clock. 
'"Sir, 

4 "  I  am  directed  to  acquaint  you  that  a  ballot  having  been 
taken  by  the  Council  whether  your  picture  called  the  'Conjurer' 
should  be  admitted  in  the  Exhibition,  it  was  determined  in  the 
negative. 

' "  You  are  therefore  desired  to  send  for  the  picture  as  soon  as  it 
may  be  convenient. 

'  "  I  am,  sir, 
'  "  Your  most  obedient  and  most  humble  servant, 

'  "  F.  M.  Newton,  R.A.,  Secretary. 
1 "  Nathaniel  Hone,  Esq." 

10 


[46  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


1  He  was  now  reduced  to  a  dilemma,  to  acquiesce  supinely  under  the 
heavy  reproach  of  having  offered  a  picture  unfit  for  the  public  eye, 
and  suffer  the  affront  of  his  labours  being  rejected  and  his  character 
traduced.  What  in  such  a  case  could  he  do  ?  but  by  appealing  to  the 
public,  to  whose  candour  and  judgment  he  submits  himself  and  his 
art,  being  sure  that  at  that  tribunal  the  mist  will  be  dispelled,  truth 
will  be  prevalent,  and  that  his  labours,  which  have  for  many  years 
given  satisfaction  and  pleasure  to  his  employers,  will  not  now  be  dis- 
approved of  on  a  more  general  inspection  by  the  indulgent  public. 

'He  trusts  that  this  explanation,  with  the  following  affidavit,  will 
prove,  first,  that  the  accusation  was  frivolous  and  nugatory,  and  that 
he  is  not  in  the  least  guilty  of  having  given  any  real  cause  of  offence 
to  Mrs.  Angelica  Kauffmann  ;  and,  secondly,  that  it  will  excuse  the 
presumption  of  offering  to  the  public  an  exhibition  singly  of  his  own 
labours  : 

'  "Middlesex  to  wit.— 7,  Nathaniel  Hone,  of  the  Royal  .Academy, 
do  make  oath  that  in  the  picture  of  a  '  Conjurer,'  offered  for  exhibition 
to  the  said  Academy  for  the  present  season,  I  never  introduced,  or  intended 
to  introduce,  any  figure  reflecting  on  Mrs.  Angelica  Kauffmann,  or  any 
other  lady  whatever ;  and  I  gave  the  most  explicit  declaration  of  this  to 
Sir  William  Chambers  and  three  other  gentlemen  of  the  Academy,  who 
called  at  my  house  for  the  purpose  of  examining  into  that  circumstance  ; 
and  I  at  the  same  time,  told  them  the  figure  they  pitched  upon  as  giving 
offence  should  be  taken  out. 

'  "Nath.  Hone. 
'  "  Sworn  before  me  this  2d  day  of  May,  1775, 

'  'k  W.  Addington." 

1  N.B. — The  figure  said  to  have  been  intended  for  Mrs.  A.  K.  is  not 
only  taken  out,  but  aJl  the  other  naked  figures,  lest  they  should  be 
said  to  be  likenesses  of  any  particular  gentlemen  or  ladies,  which  Mr. 
Hone  never  meant,  as  the  merit  of  the  picture  does  not  depend  upon 
a  few  smoked  Academy  figures,  or  even  those  well-dressed  gentlemen 
who  supply  the  place  of  those  figures  which  were  said  to  be  so  in- 
decent, though  Mr.  Hone  had  shown  the  picture  to  ladies  of  the  most 
refined  taste  and  sentiment  at  his  own  house.' 

The  following  is  a  copy  of  Mr.  Hone's  advertise- 
ment, which  appeared  in  several  of  the  public 
papers  : 


NATHANIEL  HONE  147 

'  EXHIBITION,  ST.    MARTIN'S   LANE. 

'Mr.  Hone's  exhibition  of  the  "  Conjurer"  and  one  hundred  other 
pictures  and  designs,  all  by  his  own  hands,  may  be  seen  every  day 
(Sunday  excepted)  opposite  Old  Slaughter's  Coffee-house,  the  upper 
end  of  St.  Martin's  Lane,  from  ten  in  the  morning  till  seven  in  the 
evening.  Admittance  one  shilling.  Catalogues,  with  Mr.  Hone's 
apology  to  the  public,  gratis. 

'  May  9th,  1775.' 

Hone's  picture  of  a  Brick-dust  man,  which  was 
exhibited  at  Spring  Gardens,  first  raised  his  name 
as  a  painter.  In  1769 l  he  was  elected  a  Royal 
Academician,  but  in  consequence  of  some  pique 
against  Sir  Joshua  Reynold  he  became  a  turbulent 
member.  He  died  at  his  house,  now  No.  44  in 
Rathbone  Place,  in  his  sixty-seventh  year,  and  was 
buried  August  20,  1784,  at  Hendon.  Mr.  Hone 
etched  a  portrait  of  the  Rev.  Mr.  Greenaway,  and 
engraved  his  own  likeness  in  mezzotinto,  as  well 
as  a  large  plate  of  Two  Gentlemen  in  Masquerade 
(Captain  Grose  and  Theos.  Forrest),  No.  17  in  the 
catalogue  of  his  works.  This  picture  is  now  in 
the  possession  of  Mrs.  Graham,  and  hangs  over 
the  sideboard  of  her  dining-room  at  her  house  on 
Clapham  Common. 

In  the  sale  of  his  effects  in  Rathbone  Place  was 
a  plaster  mask  of  King  Charles  II.,  taken  from  his 
face  when  dead.  When  his  pictures  were  offered 
for  sale  at  Mr.  Hutchins's,  in  King  Street,  Co  vent 
Garden,  in  March,  1785, 1  saw  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds 
most  attentively  view  the  picture  of  the  '  Conjurer  * 
for  full  ten  minutes. 

1  This  is  incorrect.     Hone  was  a  foundation  member. — Ed. 


148  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Whenever  Garrick's  name  was  mentioned,  it  was 
generally  accompanied  with  the  appellation  of 
little ;  but  I  have  often  heard  my  father  observe 
that  he  never  knew  anyone  who  spake  of  little 
Hogarth,  though  he  was  half  a  head  shorter.  Per- 
haps this  appellation  might  have  arisen  from 
Garrick's  appearing  on  the  stage  with  tall  men, 
such  as  Quin,  Barry,  Woodward,  Eeddish,  John 
Palmer,  William  Smith,  Charles  Bannister,  Brere- 
ton,  Lewis,  etc.  Dodd  was  a  little  man,  and  he 
was  often  called  '  Little  Dodd ';  and  Quick  is  now 
often  noticed,  when  walking  in  Islington  Fields,  as 
1  Little  Quick.'  In  like  manner,  Nollekens  was 
called  l  Little  Nolly  '  by  those  who  spake  of  him 
with  freedom,  and  as  '  Little  Nollekens '  by 
strangers  who  knew  nothing  but  his  person  ;  and 
yet  he  was  the  only  one  of  that  name  in  England, 
though  there  are  several  bearing  it  in  Antwerp  to 
this  day,  some  of  whom  have  boldly  declared  their 
relationship  to  him.  It  has  recently  been  proved 
that  these  pretended  relatives  are  from  a  different 
stock  and  of  another  country. 

That  great  and  good  man,  Flaxman,  the  '  Sculptor 
of  Eternity,'  as  Blake  styled  him,  was  often  called 
1  Little  Flaxman,  the  sculptor,'  though  there  was  no 
other  Flaxman  a  sculptor — indeed,  I  was  going  to 
say,  nor  ever  will  be  ;  and  if  I  had,  my  opinion 
surely  could  not  possibly  be  called  in  question  in 
less  than^e  hundred  years.  Hogarth  has  insisted 
upon  it  that  Garrick,  if  seen  alone,  would  have 
appeared  as  tall  as  Quin,  on  account  of  the  former 
being  a  thin  and  neatly-made  man,  and  the  latter, 


DIXON'S  MEZZOTINTS  149 

though  tall,  an  awkwardly  large  one.  This  asser- 
tion he  has  exemplified,  as  may  be  seen  in  an  etching 
by  F.  Cook,  from  a  sketch  by  himself,1  entitled 
1  Facsimile  of  the  proportions  of  Garrick  and 
Quin.' 

Hogarth's  assertion  as  to  this  point  is  also  most 
glaringly  visible  in  J.  Dixon's2  engraving  of  Garrick 
in  the  character  of  Abel  Drugger,  from  a  picture 
by  Zoffany,  in  which  there  is  nothing  to  enable  the 
observer  to  draw  a  comparison,  as  Garrick  is  the 
only  object  in  the  print.  Now,  the  impression  made 
upon  the  spectator  is  quite  the  contrary,  when  he  is 
viewing  him  in  the  company  of  Subtle  and  Face, 
where  a  chair  is  also  introduced,  which,  without 
any  other  auxiliary,  acts  as  a  tolerably  good  scale 
for  the  height  of  figures. 

For  a  further  corroboration  of  this  remark,  the 
reader  has  only  to  look  at  the  large  print  by  J. 
Dixon,  also  after  Zoffany's  picture  from  the  same 
play,  in  which  Barton,  Palmer,  and  Garrick  form 
the  composition,  and,  in  consequence  of  Palmer's 
height,  Garrick  appears  small.  Garrick  might  have 
appeared  as  a  large  man  if  he  had  taken  a  hint 
from  Zoffany,  who  has  painted  him  in  the  '  Farmer's 
Return,'  where  he  is  seated  in  his  kitchen,  relating 
the  sights  he  had  witnessed  in  London,  and  particu- 
larly the  story  of  the  Cock  Lane  ghost,  to  his  little 
wife  and  short  children.  In  this  beautiful  picture 
Garrick  is  represented  as  a  man  of  good  height,  as 

1  The  original   drawing  was  in  the   possession  of  the  late  J.  P. 
Kemble,  Esq. — Smith. 

2  John  Dixon  (1740-1780),  the  mezzotint  engraver. — Ed. 


ISO  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

may  be  seen  in  J.  G.  Haid's1  engraving  from  it, 
published  by  Boy  dell,  March  1,  1766. 

But  I  must  not  forget  Nollekens  in  these 
ramblings  ;  he  also  appeared  tall  when  warming 
his  hands  in  the  hall  of  the  Royal  Academy,  sur- 
rounded by  the  young  students,  who  were  listening 
to  his  good-natured  stories  of  what  happened  to  him 
when  at  Rome. 

As  he  was  once  enjoying  himself  in  this  manner, 
Mrs.  Malum,  the  housekeeper,  applied  to  him  for 
the  poker,  adding,  c  You  always  hide  my  poker. 
Why,  you  need  not  care  how  many  coals  we  burn  ; 
you  don't  buy  them  here.' 

So  good-natured,  indeed,  was  Mr.  Nollekens 
during  his  conversations  with  the  students,  that  his 
familiarity  sometimes  exposed  him  to  the  ridicule 
of  those  who  knew  not  or  forgot  the  respect  which 
they  ought  to  have  entertained  for  him  as  an 
Academician.  Once  an  impudent  fellow  brought 
an  old  brown  worsted  stocking,  similar  to  one  worn 
by  the  R.A.  when  he  had  a  sore  throat,  which,  to 
the  great  amusement  of  a  few  of  his  fellow-students, 
he  tied  round  his  neck,  and  stood  by  the  side  of 
Mr.  Nollekens  when  he  was  Visitor  in  the  Life 
Academy.  However,  it  should  be  observed,  to  the 
honour  of  the  well-disposed  part  of  the  students, 
that  the  ignorant  scoffer  was  sent  to  Coventry,  and 
for  a  twelvemonth  three-fourths  of  them  would  not 
speak  to  him. 

1  Johann  Gottfried  Haid,  a  German  engraver,  who  worked  much  in 
England,  but  retired  to  Wirtemberg  before  his  death  in  1776. — Ed. 


GARRICK  151 

I  must  acknowledge  that  at  the  time  Mr.  Carlini1 
was  Keeper,  the  Royal  Academy  students  took 
those  liberties  with  their  superiors  which  would  not 
be  noticed  now  but  by  expulsion  ;  and  it  must  give 
every  well-thinking  parent  pleasure  to  know  that 
their  moral  conduct  was  strictly  noticed  by  the  late 
worthy  Keeper,  Henry  Thomson,  Esq.,  R.A.,2  and 
that  that  gentleman's  successor,  William  Hilton, 
Esq.,  R.A.,  will  most  assiduously  promote  the  same 
rectitude  o£  conduct. 

Mrs.  Garrick  visited  the  print -room  of  the  British 
Museum  on  August  21,  1821,  for  the  purpose  of 
looking  over  the  volume  of  Mr.  Garrick's  portraits, 
which  had  been  collected  by  the  late  Dr.  Burney. 
When  she  came  to  J .  Dixon's  print  from  Dance's  pic- 
ture of  her  husband  in  the  character  of  Richard  III., 
now  in  the  front  drawing-room  of  Sir  Watkin 
Williams  Wynn's  house,  she  looked  at  me,  and 
with  a  firm  emphasis  whispered :  l  Ay,  sir,  Mr. 
Dance  used  me  scurvily  as  to  this  picture  ;  it  was  to 
have  been  mine  at  one  hundred  guineas,  and  a  place 
was  cleared  for  it,  when  to  my  great  astonishment 
he  informed  Mr.  Garrick  at  our  dinner-table,  where 
he  had  been  always  welcome,  that  he  could  sell  it 
for  fifty  or  a  hundred  guineas  more  to  Sir  Watkin 
Williams  Wynn.  "  Well,  sir,"  observed  Mr.  Gar- 
rick, "  and  you  mean  to  take  it  ?"     "  Yes,"  replied 

1  Agostino  Carlini,  R.A.,  the  sculptor,  succeeded  Moser  as  keeper 
in  1783.     See  Prefatory  Essay.— Ed. 

2  The  historical  painter  (1773  1843).  He  resigned  the  keepership 
in  1827  in  consequence  of  ill-health.  Hilton  held  the  office  till  his 
death  in  1839.— Ed. 


152  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Mr.  Dance,  for  he  was  not  then  Sir  Nathaniel,  "  I 
think  I  shall." 

c  "  Think  no  more  of  the  picture,"  whispered  Mr. 
Garrick  to  me  ;  "  in  a  short  time  yon  shall  see  a 
hetter  one  there  " — which  was  the  case,  though  he 
meant  the  compliment  to  me,  for  the  first  morning 
after  he  had  a  looking-glass,  to  the  value  of  one 
hundred  and  twenty-five  guineas,  put  up  in  the 
place  which  had  been  allotted  for  Dance's  picture. 
He  requested  me  to  go  in  and  look  at  it,  when  he 
with  his  nsnal  playfulness  peeped  over  my  shoulder. 
Sir  Watkin,  who  never  knew  a  word  of  Dance's 
ingratitude  to  Mr.  Garrick — who  had  introduced 
him  to  all  his  friends — purchased  the  picture,  and 
bestowed  a  most  splendid  frame  upon  it  at  an 
enormous  expense.' 

Mr.  Dance,  in  this  picture  of  Garrick,  has  been 
guilty  of  an  egregious  anachronism.  He  has 
actually  given  Richard  III.  the  star  of  the  Order  of 
the  Garter,  when  he  ought  to  have  known  that  it 
was  not  introduced  before  the  reign  of  King 
Charles  I.1 

1  See  Ashmole's  'History  of  the  Order  of  the  Garter'  ;  Lond., 
1672,  folio,  chap,  vii.,  pp.  215,  216.  The  origin  of  the  Star,  according 
to  that  authority,  was  a  badge  consisting  of  the  cross  of  the  Order, 
surrounded  by  the  Garter,  to  be  worn  upon  the  left  side  of  the 
ordinary  cloaks,  etc.,  of  the  Sovereign  and  Knights- Companions.  This 
was  added  to  the  insignia  by  King  Charles  I.  at  a  Chapter  held 
April  27,  in  the  second  year  of  his  reign,  1626.  '  And,'  adds  Ashmole, 
'  it  seems  it  was  not  long  after  ere  the  glory,  or  star,  as  it  is  usually 
called,  having  certain  beams  of  silver  that  spread  in  the  form  of  a 
cross,  was  introduced  and  added  thereunto,  in  imitation,  as  it  is 
thought,  of  the  French,  who  after  that  manner  wore  the  chief  ensign 
of  the  Order  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  being  the  resemblance  of  a  dove 


MRS.  NOLLEKENS'  DOG  153 

Mrs.  Nollekens  bad  a  little  dog,  which  her  father 
brought  as  a  present  to  her  from  France  ;  it  was 
considered  a  great  beauty  of  its  kind,  being  per- 
fectly white,  having  a  long  curled  woolly  mane, 
and  its  body  half  shorn  from  its  hinder  parts  ;  the 
extremities  of  its  tail  and  legs  were  left  tufted,  like 
an  heraldical  lion,  and  the  eyelids  were  rather  of  a 
red  colour,  as  those  of  the  French  breed  generally 
are.  With  this  animal  I  formed  a  particular 
acquaintance  ;  and,  as  she  was  very  good-tempered 
towards  me,  I  used  to  lay  out  my  pocket-money  in 
buying  alternately  a  pink  and  a  blue  ribbon  to 
make  her  a  collar,  with  which  Mrs.  Nollekens  was 
highly  delighted.  I  recollect  Mr.  George  Keate1 — 
whose  politeness  always  procured  him  the  good 
opinion  of  the  ladies — making  much  of  this  animal, 
and  telling  it  that  he  had  written  some  lines  upon 
Mrs.  Garrick's  little  dog,  not  unlike  her  in  feature, 
of  which  Favorie — for  she  went  sometimes  by  that 
name — ought  to  be  very  proud,  since  they  were 
considered  extremely  beautiful.  At  this  Mrs. 
Nollekens  caught  the  bait,  and  in  polite  terms 
declared  she  would  send  for  his  poems,  concluding 

irradiated  with  such-like  beams.'  The  anachronism  of  introducing 
the  Star  of  the  Garter  before  it  was  invented  has,  however,  been  com- 
mitted by  a  much  better  antiquary  than  Dance,  since  it  is  introduced 
in  the  year  1578,  in  the  romance  of  '  Kenilworth,'  by  the  author  of 
1  Waverley  '  (edit  Edinburgh,  1821,  vol.  i.,  chap,  vii.,  p.  149).  '  The 
embroidered  strap,  as  thou  callest  it,  around  my  knee,'  says  the  Earl 
of  Leicester,  '  is  the  English  Garter,  an  ornament  which  Kings  are 
proud  to  wear.  See,  here  is  the  Star  which  belongs  to  it,  and  here  is  the 
diamond  George,  the  jewel  of  the  Order.' — Smith. 

1  George  Keate  (1729-1797),  the  amateur  versifier  and  antiquary. 
—Ed. 


154  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

that  the  lines  were  to  he  found  there.  '  Yes,  madam, 
said  he,  c  I  have  introduced  them  in  the  hook,  and  I 
will  send  it,  not  only  for  your  inspection,  but 
acceptance.'  '  You  are  extremely  polite,'  answered 
Mrs.  Nollekens  ;  '  I  shall  be  most  happy  to  possess 
what  you  have  said  of  Mrs.  Garrick's  dog.' 

Before  I  entirely  leave  this  subject,  to  prove  the 
wonderfully  sagacious  and  retentive  memory  of 
Mrs.  Garrick's  little  dog  Biddy,  and  how  much  she 
must  have  noticed  her  master  when  rehearsing  his 
parts  at  home,  I  shall  give  the  following  most 
extraordinary  anecdote,  as  nearly  as  I  can,  in  the 
manner  in  which  Mrs.  Garrick  related  it  to  me  a 
short  time  before  her  death.  '  One  evening,  after 
Mr.  Garrick  and  I  were  seated  in  our  box  at  Drury 
Lane  Theatre,  he  said,  u  Surely  there  is  something 
wrong  on  the  stage,"  and  added  he  would  go  and 
see  what  it  was.  Shortly  after  this,  when  the 
curtain  was  drawn  up,  I  saw  a  person  come  forward 
to  speak  a  new  prologue  in  the  dress  of  a  country 
bumpkin,  whose  features  seemed  new  to  me  ;  and 
whilst  I  was  wondering  who  it  could  possibly  be,  I 
felt  my  little  dog's  tail  wag,  for  he  was  seated  in 
my  lap,  his  usual  place  at  the  theatre,  looking 
towards  the  stage.  "  Aha !"  said  I,  "  what !  do  you 
know  him  ?  Is  it  your  master  ?  Then  you  have 
seen  him  practise  his  part  ?"  ' 

When  I  last  had  the  gratification  of  conversing 
with  the  relator  of  this  anecdote,  she  spake  in  the 
highest  terms  of  his  present  Majesty,  George  IV., 
and  said  that  the  last  time  she  had  the  honour  of 
seeing  him,  when  Prince  of   Wales,   the  kind  and 


THE  QUEEN  AND  MRS.  GARRICK  155 


condescending:  manner  in  which  his  Royal  Highness 
sat  by  her  side  at  Hampton,  and  asked  after  her 
health,  gave  her  heartfelt  pleasure  :  4  And  I  am  not 
a  little  proud,'  added  she,  c  of  the  privilege  of  being 
allowed  to  drive  through  St.  James's  Park.' 

Lieutenant-Colonel  Phillips,  whose  venerable  age 
is  not  beyond  his  politeness,  has  also  favoured  me 
with  the  following  anecdote  of  the  late  Queen 
Charlotte  and  Mrs.  Garrick.  By  some  mistake  the 
Queen  was  announced  to  Mrs.  Garrick  at  her  house 
at  Hampton,  without  the  usual  notice  previous  to  a 
royal  visit.  Mrs.  Garrick  was  much  confused  at 
being  caught  in  the  act  of  peeling  onions  for 
pickling.  The  Queen,  however,  would  not  suffer 
her  to  stir,  but  commanded  a  knife  to  be  brought, 
observing  that  she  would  peel  an  onion  with  her, 
and  actually  sat  down,  in  the  most  condescending 
manner,  and  peeled  onions.  The  Colonel,  who 
often  relates  anecdotes  of  his  youth  and  the  dis- 
tinguished characters  whom  he  has  known,  never 
forgets  to  observe,  when  speaking  of  Queen 
Charlotte  :  8  Ay,  very  few  persons  knew  the  good- 
ness of  her  Majesty's  heart,  and  the  great  good  she 
had  done,  until  after  her  death.' 

I  shall  now  give  a  dialogue  which  was  held,  as 
nearly  as  I  can  recollect,  between  Mrs.  Nollekens 
and  Mrs.  Norman,  the  wife  of  a  celebrated  dog- 
doctor,  who  at  the  time  I  was  with  Sherwin  lived 
in  Fox  Court,  St.  James's  Street,  into  one  of  the 
houses  of  which  court  Sherwin's  premises  ex- 
tended, and  were  used  by  him  and  his  pupils  as 
engraving-rooms.     The  name  of   Norman  was  so 


156  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

extensively  known  that  I  consider  it  hardly  pos- 
sible for  many  of  my  readers  to  be  ignorant  of  his 
fame  ;  indeed,  so  much  was  he  in  requisition  that 
persons  residing  out  of  town  would  frequently 
order  the  carriage  for  no  other  purpose  than  to 
consult  Dr.  Norman  as  to  the  state  of  Biddy's 
health,  just  as  people  of  rank  now  consult  Parting- 
ton or  Thompson  as  to  the  irregularities  of  their 
children's  teeth.  The  room  in  which  Sherwin's 
pupils  were  placed  was  on  the  first-floor,  looking 
immediately  into  the  court,  so  that  it  was  impos- 
sible for  them  to  be  unacquainted  with  the  patients' 
complaints,  which  were  made  known  in  the  court 
either  to  the  doctor  or  his  wife,  who  always 
answered  from  an  upper  casement.  Bijou,  Mrs. 
Nollekens'  favourite  lap-dog,  was  put  under  the 
doctor's  regimen  by  Nollekens,  who,  it  appeared, 
had  left  her  early  one  morning,  before  we  had 
taken  possession  of  our  room. 

One  day,  about  noon,  we  heard  a  female,  who 
had  tapped  at  the  doctor's  door  with  the  stick  of 
her  parasol,  inquire  if  Mr.  Norman  was  at  home. 
1  Who  calls  ?'  interrogated  Mrs.  Norman  from 
within.  '  Mr.  Norman,  I  ask  if  he  lives  here  ?' 
Mrs.  Norman,  who  had  then  put  her  head  out 
at  the  window,  answered :  '  Yes,  he  does,  good 
woman;  what's  your  pleasure?'  '  "  Good  woman, 
what's  your  pleasure  !"  is  that  the  way  to  speak  to 
a  lady  ?  Know,  then,  my  name  is  Nollekens.'  c  Oh 
dear,  I  beg  your  pardon:  you  are  the  person  who 
sent  a  little  man  here  with  a  French  dog  the  other 
day :  how   does    she    do  ?'     '  Do  !    why    don't    you 


A  HOSPITAL  FOR  DOGS  157 


come  down,  Mrs.  Norman  ?'  '  I  come  down  ! 
what,  and  leave  all  my  dogs  !  Bless  yon,  there'd 
be  the  devil  to  pay  when  Norman  comes  home  ! 
Yon  don't  know  the  disponsibility  I  am  in :  why, 
we  have  got  Mrs.  Robinson's  mother  Mrs.  Derby's 
dog ;  and  we  have  got  the  Dnke  of  Dorset's  French 
lady's  dog,  Fidelle,  just  come  from  Duke  Street. 
Mrs.  Musters,  of  Portland  Place,  has  sent  three 
dogs,  and  we  have  Monsieur  Goubert's  from  South 
Molton  Street.  What  !  but  is  vour  bitch  ill  a^ain? 
I  am  sure  we  brought  it  about — it  was  fed  upon 
nothing  but  bread  and  milk.'  '  Bread  and  milk  !' 
exclaimed  Mrs.  Nollekens ;  J  why,  we  give  it  some 
of  the  best  bits  of  our  yard-dog's  paunches.' 
c  Bless  you,  good  woman  !  then  it  will  never  be 
well :  the  doctor  can  do  nothing  for  it,  that  I  can 
tell  you.'  By  this  time  a  fellow  silenced  Mrs. 
Nollekens,  by  inquiring  in  a  rough  voice  if  Dr. 
Normandy  was  at  home.  c  No,'  was  the  reply. 
'  Well,  then,  when  he  comes  home,  he  must  come 
to  Lady  Bunbury's  ;  one  of  her  dogs  has  had 
no  rest  for  these  three  nights,  and  her  life  is 
despaired  of.' 

I  do  not  wish  to  reflect  upon  Mrs.  Nollekens  or 
the  peculiar  attachment  of  any  other  lady  to  the 
brute  creation,  as  there  are,  I  am  certain,  tens  of 
thousands  who,  though  many  of  them  pet  their 
dogs,  also  find  delight  in  walking  miles  to  alleviate 
the  wants  of  their  fellow-creatures  with  the  balmy 
hand  of  sincere  benevolence.  Mrs.  RadclifFe,1  the 
justly-celebrated   authoress    of  '  The  Romance  of 

1  Anne  Radcliffe  (1764-1823).— Ed. 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


the  Forest,'  '  The  Mysteries  of  Udolpho,'  etc.,  was 
one  of  that  description,  and  she  had  two  pets.  The 
name  of  one  was  Fan,  that  of  the  other  Dash  ;  both 
obtained  board  and  lodging,  not  as  presents  from 
Lady  Sarah  Bunbury  or  Mrs.  Garrick,  but  taken 
up  by  her  in  the  streets,  when  they  were  outcasts 
and  unowned,  when,  as  poor  old  Bronze  would 
frequently  say  of  her  master's  broken  antiques,  no 
one  would  think  of  offering  a  brass  farthing  for 
their  services. 

Mrs.  Radcliffe's  attention  was  one  day  arrested 
by  a  boy  who  stood  silently  weeping  under  the 
gateway  of  the  Little  Stable-yard,  St.  James's  ;  he 
held  a  cord,  to  the  end  of  which  a  most  miserable 
spectacle  of  a  dog  was  tied,  shivering  between  him 
and  the  wall.  She  requested  to  know  the  cause  of 
his  grief,  and  the  poor  little  fellow,  after  sobbing 
for  some  time,  with  a  modest  reluctance  stam- 
mered, '  My  m-m-m-mother  insists  upon  my  hang- 
ing Fan  ;  she  won't  keep  her  because  her  skin  is 
bare.  Don't  touch  her,  ma'am  ;  she  has  got  the 
mange.'  '  Well,  my  little  fellow,  if  you  will  walk 
back  with  me,  I  will  not  only  give  you  half  a 
crown,  but  will  keep  your  dog,  and  you  shall  come 
and  see  it.'  When  the  poor  animal  was  safely 
lodged  at  No.  5,  Stafford  Row,  Pimlico,  her  new 
mistress  placed  her  under  proper  care  ;  and  when 
she  was  again  coated,  she  became  excessively 
admired  for  her  great  beauty,  and,  being  under  the 
tuition  of  so  amiable  a  protectress,  she  so  improved 
in  manners  as  to  be  often  noticed  by  the  la^e 
Queen  and  the  Princesses,  when  walking  with  her 


DOGS  159 

mistress  in  Windsor  Park,  at  the  time  Mrs.  Rad- 
clifFe had  a  small  cottage  in  the  town.  My 
informant  related  the  following  proof  of  Fan's  good 
breeding  and  respect  for  a  dog  under  superior 
protection. 

One  of  the  Princesses'  dogs,  a  spaniel  exactly  of 
Fanny's  size,  caught  one  end  of  a  long  bone,  at  the 
moment  Fan  had  found  it,  who,  instead  of  snarl- 
ing as  a  dog  generally  does  when  an  interloper 
attempts  to  carry  off  a  prize,  very  good-temperedly 
complied  with  the  playfulness  of  the  Princess's  dog- 
by  continuing  to  walk  by  her  side,  just  like  two 
horses  in  a  curricle,  each  holding  the  extreme  end 
of  the  bone,  to  the  no  small  amusement  of  the  royal 
equestrians,  who  frequently  recognised  and  noticed 
Mrs.  RadclifFe  as  the  authoress  and  Fanny's 
mistress. 

The  other  dog  was  of  a  large  size,  and  the  latter 
part  of  his  history  is  as  follows.  One  day  it 
happened,  as  Mr.  and  Mrs.  RadclifFe  were  walking 
along  the  Strand,  to  visit  the  exhibition  of  the 
Roval  Academicians  at  Somerset  Place,  thev  saw 
a  poor  half-starved  dog  that  had  just  been  drawn 
upon  the  pavement,  a  coach-wheel  having  broken 
one  of  its  legs.  When  they  got  up  to  the  crowd, 
as  there  was  no  master  near  or  willing  to  own  it, 
each  person  was  giving  his  opinion  as  to  the  most 
expeditious  mode  of  putting  the  unfortunate  animal 
out  of  his  misery.  Upon  this  Mrs.  RadclifFe,  with 
her  accustomed  humanity,  requested  her  husband 
to  procure  a  coach  ;  and  instead  of  proceeding  to 
the  exhibition  to  feast  upon  the  works  of  art,  they 


:6o  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


preferred  following  the  impulse  of  good-nature,  by 
ordering  the  coachman  to  Stafford  Eow,  where,  by 
skilful  attention,  the  once-wretched  animal  was  not 
only  in  a  short  time  restored  to  perfect  health,  but 
repaid  his  life-preserver  with  the  most  frolicksome 
agility,  who  ever  after  called  him  Dash. 


[  161  ] 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Anecdotes  of  Seward  and  James  Barry — Conversations  in  West- 
minster Abbey  on  waxen  figures,  fees,  alterations,  monuments,  and 
the  Gate-house — Norfolk  House,  the  birthplace  of  George  III. — 
Mr.  Nollekens'  restoration  of  the  Townley  Venus  —  Colonel 
Hamilton — Conversation  between  Mr.  Nollekens  and  Panton  Betew 
on  artists  and  the  china  manufactories  at  Bow  and  Chelsea — 
Characteristic  anecdotes  of  Betew — Early  engravings  by  Hogarth. 

Mr.  Seward,1  of  anecdotic  memory,  who  lodged  at 
the  Golden  Ball,  No.  5,  Little  Maddox  Street, 
where  the  sign  is  still  pendent,  was  perpetually 
complimenting  those  persons  of  eminence  who 
appeared  to  him  most  likely  to  contribute  to  his 
budget.  I  recollect,  when  I  was  a  student  in  the 
Royal  Academy,  seeing  him  one  night  make  up 
to  Barry,  who  was  descending  from  the  rostrum, 
and  hearing  him,  after  he  had  expressed  his 
admiration  of  his  lecture,  solicit  the  pleasure  of 
walking  part  of  the  way  home  with  him.  Mr. 
Nollekens  and  I  overtook  them  at  a  baker's  shop  in 
Catherine  Street,  when  Barry,  who  detested  Seward 
for  his  avowed  attachment  to  Fuseli,  requested  him 
to  wait  while  he  purchased  a  loaf,  and  when  he 
came  out,  had  the  audacity  to  ask  Seward  to  assist 

1  William  Seward  was  born  in  1747.     He  was  the  author  of  'Bio- 
graphiana,'  and  died  in  1799. — Ed. 

11 


1 62  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

him  in  stuffing  it  into  a  ragged  pocket  of  his  long 
great-coat.     When  he  had  accomplished  the  task, 
Barry  exclaimed,  '  It's  in  !  that's  the   way  to  be 
independent  ;  I  have   no   fixed  baker,   so   where   I 
like  the  appearance  of  the  bread,  I  buy  it.'     Nolle- 
kens,  who  had  stopped  with  me  to  notice  them, 
observed,   '  Ay,    Tom,   when   they   get  themselves 
under  the  Piazza,  Jem  will  lose  him  ;  I  know  his 
tricks    well,     when    he    dislikes     a    man.      Why, 
do  you  know,   that   fellow   Seward   sadly   wanted 
me    the    other    day    to    give    him    my    Michael 
Angelo  model  of   Venus  !"     This   beautiful  little 
gem    now    sparkles    over    the    chimney-piece    of 
Sir    Thomas    Lawrence's    front    parlour,   a    room 
enviably  rich  in  inestimable  jewels.     The  cabinets 
are  filled  with  the  choicest  drawings,  by  Michael 
Angelo,  Kaffaelle,  Rubens,  and  Rembrandt,  many 
of  which    were    formerly    dispersed    through   the 
portfolios  of  King  Charles  I.,  Rubens,  the  Earl  of 
Arundel,    Sir   Peter   Lely,   the   two    Richardsons, 
Hudson,    Moser,    Sir   Joshua    Reynolds,    Barnard, 
Ralph    AVillett,    Udney,    Earl    Spencer,  West,  and 
several  grand  collections  abroad,  from  which  they 
were  selected,  and  brought  into  this  country  by  Mr. 
Ottley  and  Mr.   Samuel  Woodburn,  two  most  ex- 
cellent judges  of  art,  to  whom   England  is  much 
indebted  for  numerous  works  of  the  old  and  great 
masters,  which   might  at  this  moment  have   been 
locked  up  in  foreign  cabinets,  had  it  not  been  for 
their  zeal  and  liberality. 

Mr.  Nollekens  having  received  an  order  for  a 
monument,  similar  in  size  to  one  which  his  employer 


WESTMINSTER  ABBEY  163 

had  pointed  out,  erected  in  AVestminster  Abbey, 
asked  my  father  to  accompany  him  thither,  and 
they  took  me  with  them  to  assist  in  the  measure- 
ment. I  recollect  the  morning  with  pleasure ;  the 
sun  enabled  us  to  look  into  every  corner  of  the 
Abbey ;  and  I  now  wish  I  had  then  been  older,  to 
have  benefited  more  by  the  interesting  remarks  by 
my  parent  and  friend. 

Mr.  Nollekens,  during  the  time  his  men  were 
moulding  parts  of  monuments  in  Westminster 
Abbey,  had  the  following  conversation  with  the 
late  Mr.  John  Catling,  the  verger,  to  the  great 
amusement  of  my  father,  who  was  also  present. 
Mr.  Nollekens:  'Why,  Mr.  Catling,  you  seem  to 
be  as  fond  of  the  Abbey  as  I  am  of  my  models  by 
Michael  Angelo.  My  man,  Finny,  tells  me  you  was 
born  in  it.'  Catling:  'No,  not  in  the  Abbey;  I 
was  born  in  the  tower,  on  the  right  hand,  just 
before  you  enter  into  the  little  cloisters.'  Nollekens: 
4  Oh,  I  know ;  there's  some  steps  to  go  up,  and  a 
wooden  rail  to  hold  by.  Now,  I  wonder  you 
don't  lose  that  silver  thing  that  you  carry  before 
the  Dean,  when  you  are  going  through  the  cloisters. 
Pray,  why  do  you  suffer  the  schoolboys  to  chalk  the 
stones  all  over  ?  I  have  been  spelling  "  pudding," 
"grease,"  "lard,"  "butter,"  "kitchen-stuff,"  and 
I  don't  know  what  all.'  Catling :  '  Whv,  therebv 
hangs  a  tale — do  you  know  that  the  Dean  married 
a  woman  ?'  Nollekens :  l  Well,  so  he  ought  ;  the 
clergy  are  allowed  to  marry  nowadays ;  it  is  not 
as  it  was  formerly  ;  you  know,  I  have  been  at  Rome, 
and  know  enough  about  their  customs.'     [Here  Mr. 


1 64  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Catling  gave  Mr.  Nollekens  an  admonitory  pinch 
upon  the  elbow,  for  at  that  moment  the  Bishop  was 
passing  through  Poets'  Corner  from  the  Deanery, 
on  his  way  to  the  House  of  Lords.]  Nollekens: 
'  What  does  he  carry  that  bine  bag  with  him  for  ?' 
Catling:  'It  contains  his  papers  upon  the  business 
of  the  day.'  Nollekens :  '  ( )h,  now  you  talk  of 
papers,  Mrs.  Nollekens  bid  me  to  ask  you  where 
Ashburnham  House  is,  that  held  the  Cotton  paper, 
I  think  it  was.'  Catling:  '  Your  good  lady  means 
the  Cottonian  Manuscripts,  sir ;  it  is  in  Little 
Dean's  Yard,  on  the  north  side ;  it  has  a  stone 
entrance,  designed  by  Inigo  Jones,  and  is  now 
inhabited  by  Dr.  Bell,  who  was  Chaplain  to  the 
Princess  Amelia.'  Nollekens:  ;  Oh,  I  know,  he  was 
robbed  by  Sixteen  -  string  Jack  in  Gunnersbury 
Lane;  thank  ye.  And  she  wants  to  know  what 
you've  done  with  the  wooden  figures,  with  wax 
masks,  all  in  silk  tatters,  that  the  Westminster 
boys  called  the  "Ragged  Regiment";  she  says 
they  was  always  carried  before  the  corpse  for- 
merly.' Catling:  '  Why,  we  had  them  all  out  the 
other  day,  for  John  Carter  and  young  Smith  ttf 
draw  from  ;  they  are  put  up  in  those  very  narrow 
closets,  between  our  wax  figures  of  Queen  Elizabeth 
and  Lord  Chatham  in  his  robes,  in  Bishop  Islip's 
Chapel,  where  you  have  seen  the  stained-glass  of 
a  boy  slipping  down  a  tree,  a  slip  of  a  tree,  and  the 
eye  slipping  out  of  its  socket.'  Nollekens :  '  What  ! 
where  the  Poll  Parrot  is  ?  I  wonder  you  keep  such 
stuff ;  why,  at  Antwerp,  where  my  father  was  born, 
they  put  such  things  in  silks  outside  in  the  streets. 


WESTMINSTER  ABBEY  165 


I  don't  mind  going  to  Mrs.  Salmon's  Waxwork,  in 
Fleet  Street,  where  Mother  Shipton  gives  yon  a  kick 
as  yon  are  going  out.  Oh  dear !  yon  should  not  have 
such  rubbish  in  the  Abbey  ;  and  then  for  yon  to  take 
money  for  this  foolish  thing  and  that  foolish  thing, 
so  that  nobody  can  come  in  to  see  the  line  works  of 
art  without  being  bothered  with  Queen  Catherine's 
bones,  the  Spanish  Ambassador's  coffin,  the  lady 
who  died  by  pricking  her  finger,  and  that  nasty 
cap  of  G.eneral  Monk's  you  beg  of  people  to  put 
money  into,  just  like  the  money-box  that  I  recollect 
they  used  to  put  down  from  the  Gate-house.  You 
had  better  tell  Mr.  Dean  to  see  that  the  monuments 
don't  want  dusting,  and  to  look  after  the  West- 
minster bovs,  and  not  let  them  break  the  ornaments 
off  to  play  at  sconce  with  in  the  cloisters.  Now,  at 
Rome,  and  all  other  churches  abroad,  a  man  may 
<£0  in  and  draw ;  but  here  he  must  write  and  wait, 
and  be  brought  up  like  a  criminal  before  the  Dean. 
Why,  do  you  know,  I  have  been  told  thajt  Stothard, 
one  of  our  Academicians,  had  a  great  deal  of  trouble 
with  the  man ;  and  then  he  talked  about  the  proper 
fees  !  Bless  my  heart,  it's  very  bad  I'1  Catling  : 
4  My  good  sir,  you  are  very  severe  with  us   this 

1  When  all  the  demands  for  viewing  the  various  curiosities 
of  Westminster  Abbey  are  added  together,  the  sum  will  amount 
to  a  little  more  now  than  it  did  lol  years  ago,  as  can  be  proved 
by  a  reference  to  Peachan's  truly  interesting  tract,  entitled  '  The 
Worth  of  a  Penny,'  published  in  the  year  1667,  in  which  the  author 
says  : 

'  For  a  penny  you  may  hear  a  must  eloquent  oration  upon  our 
English  kings  and  queens,  if,  keeping  your  hands  off,  you  will  seriously 
listen  to  David  Owen,  who  keeps  the  monuments  in  Westminster.' — 
Smith. 


1 66  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

morning.  Let  me  ask  vou  what  would  become  of 
the  gentlemen  of  the  choir,  and  myself,  as  well  as 
the  Dean,  if  we  did  not  take  money  ?'  Nollekens  : 
4  What's  become  of  that  curious  old  picture  that 
used  to  hang,  when  I  was  a  boy,  next  to  the 
pulpit  ?'  Catling :  '  You  mean  the  whole-length 
portrait  of  King  Richard  II.  in  his  robes  :  that  is 
now  put  up  in  the  Jerusalem  Chamber  in  the 
Deanery ;  I  have  a  print  of  it  by  Carter.'  Nolle- 
kens :  i  My  mother  had  one  by  Virtue  ;  she  was 
acquainted  with  him,  and  at  that  time  he  lived  in 
Brownlow  Street,  Drary  Lane.  Well,  and  what  has 
become  of  Queen  Catherine's  bones  ?'  Catling  : 
4  Oh,  the  remains  of  her  bones  have  been  gone 
long  ago  !' 

They  were  now  interrupted  by  old  Gayfere,  the 
Abbey  mason,  who  exclaimed,  as  he  came  toddling 
on  :  '  Ah,  Mr.  Nollekens,  are  you  here  ?'  Nollekens  : 
4  Here  !  yes  ;  and  why  do  you  suffer  that  Queen 
Anne's  altar  to  remain  here,  in  a  Gothic  building  ? 
Send  it  back  to  Whitehall,  where  it  came  from. 
And  why  don't  you  keep  a  better  look-out,  and  not 
suffer  the  fingers  of  figures  and  the  noses  of  busts 
to  be  knocked  off  by  them  Westminster  boys  ?' 
Gay/ere :  '  Why,  what  an  ungrateful  little  man  you 
are  !  Don't  it  give  you  a  job  now  and  then  ?  Did 
not  Mr.  Dolben  have  a  new  nose  put  upon  Camden's 
face  the  other  day  at  his  own  expense  ?  I  believe 
I  told  you  that  I  carried  the  rods  when  Fleetcraft 
measured  the  last  work  at  the  north  tower  when 
the  Abbey  was  finished.'  Nollekens :  '  There's  the 
bell  tolling.     Oh  no,  it's  the  quarters.     I  used  to 


WESTMINSTER  ABBEY  167 

hear  them  when  I  was  in  the  Abbey  working  with 
my  master  Scheemakers.  There's  a  bird  flying  !' 
Gay/ere :  '  A  bird  ?  Ay,  yon  may  see  a  hundred 
birds  ;  they  come  in  at  the  broken  panes  of 
glass.' 

Nollekens :  '  Here  comes  Mr.  Champneys.  Well, 
yon  have  been  singing  at  St.  Paul's,  and  now  you 
are  come  to  sing  here.  Why  don't  you  put  a  little 
more  powder  in  your  wig  ?  Why,  it  is  as  brown  as 
my  maid  Bronze's  skin  now  is  ;  that's  what  is 
called  a  Busby,  ain't  it  ?'  Champneys :  '  It  is,  Mr. 
Nollekens.  Pray  how  is  Mrs.  Nollekens  ?  I  was 
once  a  beau  of  hers.'  Nollekens :  'Oh  dear  !  I  was 
looking  at  his  monument,  to  see  if  it  was  the  same 
wig,  but  he  has  a  cap  on.'  Champneys :  c  That's  a 
fine  monument,  Mr.  Nollekens.'  Nollekens :  c  Yes, 
a  very  good  one  ;  it  was  done  by  Bird.1  Mrs. 
Nollekens  said  he  was  fond  of  flogging  the  West- 
minster boys.'  Champneys :  c  It  is  said  so.  Our 
friend  Boberts,  of  the  Exchequer,  has  Busby's 
house  at  Ealing,  where  Busby's  Walk  still  remains, 
on  which  the  doctor  used  to  exercise  of  a  morning, 
to  "wash  his  lungs,"  as  he  used  to  say.'  Nollekens : 
1  What  have  you  done  with  the  old  Gothic  pulpit  ?' 
Catling :  '  It  has  been  conveyed  to  our  vestry,  the 
Chapel  of  St.  Blaize,  south  of  Poets'  Corner — a 
very  curious  part  of  the  Abbey,  not  often  shown : 
did  you  ever  see  it  ?  It's  very  dark  ;  there  is  an 
ancient  picture,  on  the  east  wall,  of  a  figure,  which 
can  be  made   out  tolerably  well,  after  the  eye  is 

1  Francis  Bird,  called  the  founder  of  English  sculpture.     He  was 
born  in  1667,  and  died  in  1731.— Ed. 


1 68  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


accustomed  to  the  dimness  of  the  place.     Did  you 
ever  notice  the  remaining  colours  of  the  curious 
little   figure    that   was    painted    on    the   tomb    of 
Chaucer?'     Nollekens :   'No,  that's    not   at   all    in 
my     way.'      c  Pray,    Mr.    Nollekens,'     asked    Mr. 
Champneys,  '  can  you  give  me  the  name  of   the 
sculptor  who  executed  the  basso-relievo  of  Towns- 
end's  monument  ?     I  have  applied  to  several  of  my 
friends  among  the  artists,  but  I  have  never  been 
able  to  obtain  it :   in  my  opinion,  the  composition 
and  style  of  carving  are  admirable ;  but  I  am  sorry 
to  find  that  some  evil-minded  person  has  stolen  one 
of  the    heads.'      Nollekens :    c  That's    what    I    say. 
Dean   Horsley  should  look  after   the   monuments 
himself.    Hang  his  waxworks  !     Yes,  I  can  tell  you 
who   did    it — Tom    Carter   had   the    job,    and   he 
employed  another  man  of  the  name  of  Eckstein1 
to   model   the    tablet.      It's  very  clever.     I  don't 
know  what  else  he  has  done  besides  ;  his  brother 
kept  a  public-house,  the  sign  of  the  Goat  and  Star, 
at  the  corner  of  Tash  Court,  Tash  Street,  Gray's 
Inn   Lane.      Bartholomew   Chenev    modelled    and 
carved    the    figures    of    Fame    and   Britannia    for 
Captain  Cornwall's  monument  ;   Sir  Robert  Taylor 
gave  him  four  pounds  fifteen  shillings  a  week.' 

One  afternoon,  whilst  I  was  drawing  in  the 
cloisters  of  Westminster  Abbey,  Mr.  Gayfere  ob- 
served that  he  had  met  Flaxman.     ;  Yes,'  answered 

1  In  1762  the  above  artist,  Mr.  John  Eckstein,  received  from  the 
Society  of  Arts,  for  a  basso-relievo  in  Portland  stone,  the  premium  of 
£15  15s.,  and  in  1764,  for  a  basso-relievo  in  marble,  the  sum  of 
£52  10s. — Smith.  Eckstein  was  a  painter  as  well  as  a  modeller.  He 
disappeared  in  1798,  being  then  about  sixty  years  of  age.— Ed. 


WESTMINSTER  169 


I,  '  he  has  just  been  so  good  as  to  point  out  to  me 
those  beautiful  little  figures  that  surround  the  tomb 
of  Aymer  de  Valence,  which  he  advises  me  to  draw 
from.'  Gay/ere :  '  He  is  a  very  clever  man,  and  bears 
a  good  character.'  [I  can  safely  venture  to  say  that, 
had  Mr.  Gay  fere  been  living  now,  he  would  have 
said  he  was  a  great  man,  and  bore  the  best  of 
characters.]  Gayfere :  '  Pray,  did  your  father  ever 
see  a  print  or  a  drawing  of  the  Gate-house  Y  4  No, 
he  never  did  ;  I  have  often  questioned  him  about  it. 
I  remember  it,  sir  ;  it  stood,  as  you  well  know, 
across  the  street,  at  the  end  of  the  houses  opposite 
to  the  west  entrance  of  the  Abbey  ;  one  archway 
led  into  Tothill  Street,  and  another,  to  the  left,  was 
opposite  the  entrance  to  Dean's  Yard.  I  recollect 
walking  under  it  with  my  grandmother,  and  seeing 
a  tin  box  that  was  let  down  with  a  string  for  money 
out  of  one  of  the  windows  of  the  prison,  and  hear- 
ing a  person  in  a  hollow  voice  cry,  "  Pray  remember 
the  poor  prisoners  !"  So  I  have  at  Old  Newgate. 
That  building  stood  across  Newgate  Street,  near 
the  south-east  corner  of  St.  Sepulchre's  Church. 
Both  these  gates  were  not  very  unlike  the  old  gate 
now  remaining  of  St.  John,  Clerkenwell,  in  St. 
John's  Lane,  where  Mr.  Cave,  the  predecessor  of 
the  house  of  Nichols,  first  printed  the  Gentleman  x 
Magazine?  Gayfere :  '  Did  you  ever  hear  the  echo 
on  the  centre  of  Westminster  Bridge  ?  If  you  2:0 
to  one  of  the  middle  alcoves,  and  speak  in  a  whisper, 
putting  your  mouth  close  to  the  wall,  to  a  friend  on 
the  opposite  side,  after  he  has  placed  his  ear  close  to 
the  centre ,of  the  other  alcove,  he  will  hear  every 


170  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

syllable  you  utter  as  distinctly  as  he  would  if  you 
had  both  been  in  the  gallery  of  St.  Paul's.' 

When  ffoino-  with  Mr.  Nollekens  one  Sunday 
morning  to  see  Mr.  Gainsborough's  pictures,  he 
stopped  at  the  Duke  of  Norfolk's  house  in  St. 
James's  Square,  and  said,  '  There  !  in  that  very 
house  our  King  was  born  ;  my  mother  used  to  show 
it  to  me.'  Recollecting  this  remark,  I  applied  for 
confirmation  of  it  to  the  Rev.  James  Dallaway,1 
who  had  been  the  late  Duke  of  Norfolk's  chaplain, 
and,  with  his  usual  liberality,  he  immediately 
favoured  me  with  the  following  very  satisfactory 
information,  which  I  now  give  in  that  gentleman's 
own  words.  '  Arundel  House  was  taken  down  in 
1678,  and  its  site  converted  into  Norfolk,  Surrey, 
Arundel,  and  Howard  Streets,  including  what  had 
been  called  Arundel  Rents.  The  present  Norfolk 
House,  in  St.  James's  Square,2  was  built  from  a 
design  of  R.  Brettingham  in  1742,  by  Thomas,  Duke 

1  This  gentleman  has  just  completed  a  new  edition  of  Walpole's 
1  Anecdotes  of  Painters,'  in  which,  I  trust,  there  are  not  only  many  of 
Lord  Orford's  errors  corrected,  but  new  information  given  of  English 
artists,  of  whom  his  lordship  appeared  ignorant.  There  certainly  is 
a  more  interesting  account  of  Vandyke  than  any  that  has  yet  appeared. 
— Smith.     Dallaway  was  born  in  1763,  and  died  in  1834. — Ed. 

2  It  had  been  previously  the  site  of  St.  Alban's  House,  built  by 
Htnry  Jernrvn,  Earl  of  St.  Albans,  and  was  sold  by  Henry,  Duke  of 
Portland,  for  £10,000.  In  1738  only  the  buildings  on  the  north  side 
of  the  inner  court  were  completed,  which  were  lent  to  Frederick, 
Prince  of  Wales,  as  a  temporary  residence  till  Leicester  House  was 
finished.  On  May  24,  1738,  the  late  King  George  was  born,  and, 
being  very  sickly,  was  baptized  the  same  day.  He  was  a  seven- 
months  child.  Prince  Frederick  presented  the  Duchess  of  Norfolk 
with  miniatures  in  enamel  of  himself  and  the  Princess,  set  in 
brilliants.'— Smith. 


THE  TOWN  LEY  VENUS  171 


of  Norfolk,  and  finished  by   his   brother   Edward 
in  176—.' 

As  we  were  turning  round  to  proceed  to  Pall 
Mall,  Mr.  Charles  Townley  accosted  Mr.  Nollekens, 
who  immediately,  in  the  open  street,  loudly  com- 
menced his  observations  in  what  he  thought  the 
Italian  language  ;  but  as  he  was  very  noisy  in  his 
jargon,  Mr.  Townley  requested  him  to  confine  him- 
self to  English,  or  the  people  in  the  street  would 
notice  them.  Mr.  Townlev  then  desired  him  to 
send  for  his  small  Venus,  in  order  to  model  a  pair 
of  arms  to  it.  That  gentleman  also  wished  him  to 
try  them  in  various  positions,  such  as  holding  a 
dove,  the  beak  of  which  might  touch  her  lips, 
entwining  a  wreath,  or  looking  at  the  eye  of  a 
serpent.  Nollekens  :  l  Well,  I'll  send  for  it,  then  ; 
shall  you  be  at  home  when  my  man  comes  ?' 
Mr.  Townley:  'Send  to-morrow  at  ten  o'clock, 
when  I  shall  be  at  home.'  Nollekens:  'Which  way 
now  are  you  going?'  Mr.  Townley:  'This  way, 
Mr.  Nollekens  ;  good-morning  to  you  !'  Nollekens 
called  after  him,  '  Well,  I'll  send.'  Strange  to  tell, 
I  stood  to  Mr.  Nollekens  for  all  the  various  posi- 
tions he  could  devise  for  the  arms,  and  after  six 
changes  the  present  ones  were  carved,  the  right 
one  of  which  is  too  much  like  one  of  the  arms  of 
the  Venus  de  Medici,  which  are  looked  upon  as  the 
work  of  Baccio  Bandinelli.  This  statue  is  now  in 
the  British  Museum,  and  measures  three  feet  six 
inches  and  five-eights,  including  the  plinth.  A 
modern  editor  has  roundly  asserted  that  Gavin 
Hamilton  directed  Mr.   Nollekens   in    his  restora- 


172  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

tion  of  the  arms  of  this  statue.     Gavin  Hamilton1 
was  in  Rome  at  the  time. 

Upon  our*  arrival  at  Mr.  Gainsborough's,  the 
third  west  division  of  Schomberg  House,  Pall  Mall, 
the  artist  was  listening  to  a  violin,  and  held  up  his 
finger  to  Mr.  Nollekens  as  a  request  of  silence. 
Colonel  Hamilton  was  playing  to  him  in  so 
exquisite  a  style  that  Gainsborough  exclaimed, 
'  Now,  my  dear  Colonel,  if  you  will  but  go  on,  I 
will  give  you  that  picture  of  the  boy  at  the  stile, 
which  you  have  so  often  wished  to  purchase  of  me.' 
Mr.  Gainsborough,  not  knowing  how  long  Nollekens 
would  hold  his  tongue,  gave  him  a  book  of  sketches 
to  choose  two  from,  which  he  had  promised  him. 
As  Gainsborough's  versatile  fancy  was  at  this 
period  devoted  to  music,  his  attention  was  so 
riveted  to  the  tones  of  the  violin  that  for  nearly 
half  an  hour  he  was  motionless ;  after  which  the 
Colonel  requested  that  a  hackney-coach  might  be 
sent  for,  wherein  he  carried  off  the  picture.  It  has 
been  engraved  by  Stow,2  a  pupil  of  Woollett.  Mr. 
Gainsborough,  after  he  had  given  Mr.  Nollekens 
the  two  drawings  he  had  selected,  requested  him  to 
look  at  the  model  of  an  ass's  head  which  he  had  just 
made.     Nollekeiis:  'You  should  model   more  with 

1  Gavin  Hamilton,  a  Scotch  portrait-painter,  born  at  Lanark  in 
1730,  spent  the  greater  part  of  his  life  in  Rome,  and  was  considered 
the  leading  authority  on  Roman  antiquities.  He  died  in  that  city  in 
1797  of  a  fever  caused  by  anxiety  lest  the  French  invaders  should 
destroy  his  beloved  monuments. — Ed. 

2  James  Stow,  a  line-engraver,  the  son  of  an  agricultural  labourer. 
His  precocious  promise  led  to  his  beiog  largely  patronized  ;  his  talent, 
however,  soon  evaporated.  He  was  apprenticed  to  Woollett,  and  then 
to  W.  Sharp.— En. 


GAINSBOROUGH  173 


your  thumbs ;  thumb  it  about  till  you  get  it  into 
shape.'  '  What,'  said  Gainsborough,  '  in  this 
manner  ?'  having  taken  up  a  bit  of  clay,  and 
looking  at  a  picture  of  Abel's  Pomeranian  Dog 
which  hung  over  the  chimney-piece — *  this  way  ?' 
•  Yes,'  said  Nollekens ;  '  you'll  do  a  great  deal  more 
with  your  thumbs.' 

Mr.  Gainsborough,  by  whom  I  was  standing, 
observed  to  me  :  '  You  enjoyed  the  music,  my  little 
fellow,  and  I  am  sure  you  long  for  this  model  ; 
there,  I  will  give  it  to  you  ' — and  I  am  delighted 
with  it  still.  I  have  never  had  it  baked,  fearing  it 
might  fly  in  the  kiln,  as  the  artist  had  not  kneaded 
the  clay  well  before  he  commenced  working  it,  and 
I  conclude  that  the  model  must  still  contain  a 
quantity  of  fixed  air. 

Colonel  Hamilton  above-mentioned  was  not  only 
looked  upon  as  one  of  the  first  amateur  violin- 
players,  but  also  one  of  the  first  gentlemen  pugilists. 
I  was  afterwards  noticed  by  him  in  my  art  as  an 
etcher  of  landscapes ;  and  have  frequently  seen  him 
spar  with  the  famous  Mendoza  in  his  drawing-room 
in  Leicester  Street,  Leicester  Square. 

The  following  dialogue  took  place  in  Greenwood's 
auction-room,  during  the  sale  of  Barnard's  collec- 
tion of  drawings,  between  Mr.  Nollekens  and 
Panton  Betew.  Mr.  Betew  had  been  a  silversmith 
of  the  old  school,  and  also  a  dealer  in  pictures, 
drawings,  and  other  works  of  art.  I  recollect  him 
well  in  my  boyish  days,  at  his  house  in  Old 
Compton  Street,  Soho,  at  which  time  he  was 
generally    accosted   by  his  old   friends  under   the 


174  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

free-and-easy  appellation  of  Fanny.  Mr.  Panton 
Betew :  '  Well,  Mr.  Nollekens,  time  has  made  little 
difference  in  yonr  looks  ;  you  walk  just  in  the  same 
way,  with  your  cane  and  your  ruffles,  as  you  did 
twenty  years  ago,  when  I  sold  you  Roubiliac's 
model,  which  he  designed  for  General  Wolfe's 
monument ;  Wilton  was  the  successful  candidate, 
he  gained  the  order.'  Nollekens :  4 1  remember  it 
very  well ;  you  would  have  the  odd  sixpence  of  me. 
Pray  what  became  of  that  poor  fellow,  Chattelain,1 
who  used  to  work  for  Vivares  ?  I  once  saw  several 
of  his  drawings  in  your  window.'  Betew :  '  Yes,  I 
bought  many  drawings  of  him  ;  and  there's  a  great 
deal  of  spirit  in  what  he  did.  But  he  died  at  the 
White  Bear  in  Piccadillv ;  the  landlord  came  to 
me,  knowing  that  I  knew  him,  to  ask  me  to  attend 
his  funeral.  Poor  fellow  !  the  parish  buried  him 
in  the  Pest  Fields,  Carnaby  Market.  I  went, 
Vivares2  went,  and  so  did  M'Ardell  and  several 
others.  I  recollect  well,  he  was  a  Roman  Catholic, 
and  all  the  common  people  who  frequented  the 
Romish  Chapel  in  Warwick  Street  followed  ;  and 
the  bovs  called  it  an  Irish  funeral,  for  there  were 
very  few  of  us  in  black  coats.'  Nollekens :  '  Poor 
fellow  !  I  lost  sight  of  him  for  some  years,  and 
could  not  tell  what  had  become  of  him.  I  re- 
member a  tallow-chandler  used  to  lend  me  some  of 
his  drawings  to  copy  when  I  was  quite  a  youngster.' 

1  Jean  Baptiste  Claude  Chatelaine  (1710-1771).     His  real  name  was 
Philippe.— Ed. 

2  Thomas  Vivare?,  the  landscape  engraver  (1709-1780),  a  pupil  of 
Chatelaine.— Ed. 


NATHANIEL  TULL  175 


Betew  :  '  Ay,  I  had  many  drawings  and  pictures  by 
young  artists,  very  clever  fellows ;  but  they  are 
nearly  all  gone  now.  There  was  Brooking,1  the 
ship-painter  :  he  died,  poor  fellow !  just  as  he  was 
getting  into  full  song,  as  the  saying  is  ;  and  there 
was  Tull,2  the  landscape-painter,  he  was  a  genius : 
he  married  the  King's  butcher's  daughter,  in  St. 
James's  Market,  and  became  the  schoolmaster  at 
Queen  Elizabeth's  School  in  Tooley  Street,  in  the 
Borough. 

c  I  have  a  few  of  his  pictures  by  me  now ;  his 
style  was  an  imitation  of  Hobbima's.  Vivares  has 
engraved  four  of  them,  and  very  pretty  they  are. 
His  colouring  was  rather  black  ;  but  he  was  a  self- 
taught  artist,  as  people  call  those  who  don't 
regularly  study  under  others,  but  pick  up  their 
information  by  degrees.  Well,  and  then  there  was 
your  great  Mr.  Gainsborough  ;  I  have  had  many 
and  many  a  drawing  of  his  in  my  shop-window 
before  he  went  to  Bath.  Ay,  and  he  has  often 
been  glad  to  receive  seven  or  eight  shillings  from 
me  for  what  I  have  sold :  Paul  Sandby  knows  it 
well.'  Nollekens :  c  What  do  you  want  for  that 
model  of  a  boy  ?  I  suppose  you  have  got  it  still  ?' 
Betew :  i  Why,  now,  why  can't  you  say  Fiamingo's 
boy  ?  You  know  it  to  be  one  of  his,  and  you  also 
know  that  no  man  ever  modelled  boys  better  than 
he  did  :  it  is  said  that  he  was  employed  to  model 
children    for   Rubens   to   put    into   his    pictures.' 

1  Charles  Brooking  (1723-1759),  who  painted  in  the  dockyard  at 
Deptford.— Ed. 

2  Nathaniel  Tull,  who  died  in  1762.— Ed. 


176  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Nollekens :  '  Well,  what  must  I  give  you  for  it  ?' 
Betew :  l  Fifteen  shillings  is  the  money  I  want  for 
it.'  Nollekens :  '  No  ;  ten.'  Betew :  '  Now,  my  old 
friend,  how  can  you  rate  art  in  that  manner  ?  You 
would  not  model  one  for  twentv  times  ten  ;  and  if 
you  did,  you  could  not  think  of  comparing  it  with 
that.  Why,  vou  are  obliged  to  s^ive  more  at 
auctions  when  Lord  Rockingham  or  Mr.  Burke  is 
standing  by  you.  No,  I  will  not  'bate  a  farthing.' 
Nollekens :  '  Well,  I'll  take  it.  Do  you  still  buy 
broken  silver  ?  I  have  some  odd  sleeve-buttons, 
and  Mrs.  Nollekens  wants  to  get  rid  of  a  chased 
watch-case  by  old  Moser — one  that  he  made  when 
lie  used  to  model  for  the  Bow  manufactory.' 
Betew :  '  Ay,  I  know  there  were  many  very  clever 
things  produced  there.  What  very  curious  heads 
for  canes  they  made  at  that  manufactory  !  I  think 
Crowther  was  the  proprietor's  name  ;  he  had  a  very 
beautiful  daughter,  who  is  married  to  Sir  James 
Lake.  Nat.  Hone  painted  a  portrait  of  her  in  the 
character  of  Diana,  and  it  was  one  of  his  best 
pictures.  There  were  some  clever  men  who 
modelled  for  the  Bow  concern,  and  they  produced 
several  spirited  figures  :  Quin  in  FalstafF ;  Garrick 
in  Richard ;  Frederick,  Duke  of  Cumberland,  striding 
triumphantly  over  the  Pretender,  who  is  begging 
quarter  of  him ;  John  Wilkes,  and  so  forth.' 
Nollekens :  '  Mr.  Moser,  who  was  the  keeper  of 
our  Academy,  modelled  several  things  for  them. 
He  was  a  chaser  originally.'  Betew :  '  Bless  you ! 
I  knew  him  well.  My  friend  Grignon,  the  watch- 
maker, in  Russell  Street,  Covent  Garden,  advised 


CHELSEA  CHINA  177 

him  to  learn  to  enamel  trinkets  for  watches ;  and 
he  succeeded  so  well  that  the  Queen  patronized 
him,  and  he  did  several  things  for  the  King.  It  is 
said  his  Majesty  was  so  pleased  with  him  that  he 
once  ordered  him  a  hatful  of  money  for  some  of 
his  works/  Nollekens :  '  So  I've  heard.'  Betew  : 
4  Chelsea  was  another  place  for  china.'  Nollekens  : 
c  Do  yon  know  where  that  factory  stood  ?'  Betew : 
4  Why,  it  stood  upon  the  site  of  Lord  Dartery's 
house,  just  beyond  the  bridge.'  Nollekens :  i  My 
father  worked  for  them  at  one  time.'  Betew:  'Yes, 
and  Sir  James  Thornhill  designed  for  them.  Mr. 
Walpole,  at  Strawberry  Hill,  has  a  dozen  plates  by 
Sir  James,  which  he  purchased  at  Mrs.  Hogarth's 
sale  in  Leicester  Square.  Paul  Ferg1  painted  for 
them.  Ay,  that  was  a  curious  failure.  The 
cunning  rogues  produced  very  white  and  delicate 
ware  ;  but  then  they  had  their  clay  from  China, 
which  when  the  Chinese  found  out,  they  would  not 
let  the  captains  have  any  more  clay  for  ballast, 
and  the  consequence  was  that  the  whole  concern 
failed.' 

Many  of  my  readers  may  recollect  Fielding's 
descriptions  of  the  Man  of  the  Hill,  in  his  l  Tom 
Jones,'  and  such  another  human  form  Nature  dis- 
played in  Panton  Betew  :  his  dress  differed  from 
the  general  mode ;  he  wore  a  loose  dark-brown 
greatcoat,  with,  generally,  a  red  cloth  waistcoat, 
black    shalloon    small-clothes,   dark -gray  wrorsted 

1  Francis  Paul  Ferg,  an  Austrian  landscape-painter,  born  in  Vienna 
in  1689.  He  came  to  London  in  1718,  and  worked  here  until  his  death 
in  1740.— Ed. 

12 


178  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

stockings,  easy  square-toed  shoes,  with  small  silver 
buckles,  and  a  large  slouched  hat  with  a  close 
round  crown,  without  the  least  nap,  being  often 
brushed,  for  cleanliness'  sake,  with  the  shoe, 
shining,  or  table  brush. 

He  was  well  known  to  all  the  fish-vendors  in 
Lombard  Court,  Seven  Dials,  as  a  purchaser  of  fish 
for  two ;  which  provender  he  was  not  ashamed  to 
carry  home  in  a  dark  snuff-coloured  silk  handker- 
chief, always  taking  care  to  hold  it  in  his  right 
hand,  that  he  might  display  a  brilliant  ring,  which 
he  said  he  wore  in  memory  of  his  mother.  The 
watchman  shut  and  opened  his  shop.  I  remember 
his  leaving  Old  Compton  Street  for  one  of  his 
mother's  houses  in  Nassau  Street,  St.  James's 
Market,  and  afterwards  his  living  in  a  house  in 
Chelsea,  beyond  what  was  formerly  called  the  Five 
Fields :  upon  which  a  new  city  of  most  magnificent 
mansions  is  now  in  course  of  building,  to  the 
wonderful  increase  of  the  princely  income  of  the 
Earl  Grosvenor. 

In  his  house  at  Chelsea,  where  Betew  died,  my 
father  and  I  have  often  visited  him.  Independently 
of  his  knowledge  of  the  origin  of  the  artists  of 
the  last  century,  he  was  a  well-informed  person 
upon  the  general  topics  of  conversation  ;  and  he 
has  been  heard  to  say  that  he  liked  to  converse 
with  a  man  whom  he  could  swop  an  idea  with.  He 
was  intimate  with  Hogarth,  and  frequently  pur- 
chased pieces  of  plate  with  armorial  bearings 
engraved  upon  them  by  that  artist,  which  he  cleared 
out  for  the  next  possessor ;  but,  unfortunately  for 


HOGARTH  179 


the  Stanleyean  Collection,  without  rubbing  off  a 
single  impression. 

This  was  not  the  case  with  Morison,  a  silver- 
smith, who  at  that  time  lived  in  Cheapside ;  he  took 
off  twenty-five  impressions  of  a  large  silver  dish, 
engraved  by  Hogarth,  which  impressions  he  not 
only  numbered  as  they  were  taken  off,  but  attested 
each  with  his  own  signature.  Should  this  page 
meet  the  eyes  of  any  branches  of  the  good  old- 
fashioned  families  which  have  carefully  preserved 
the  plate  of  Oliver  their  uncle  or  Deborah  their 
aunt,  I  sincerely  implore  them,  should  the  armorial 
bearings  be  the  production  of  the  early  part  of 
the  last  century,  to  cause  a  few  impressions  to  be 
taken  from  them  ;  for  I  am  inclined  to  believe 
it  very  possible  that  some  curious  specimens  of 
Hogarth's  dawning  genius  may  yet  in  that  way  be 
rescued  from  future  furnaces. 

The  following  use  was  made  of  Hogarth's  plates 
of  the  Idle  and  Industrious  Apprentices,  by  the 
late  John  Adams,  of  Edmonton,  schoolmaster :  The 
prints  were  framed  and  hung  up  in  the  schoolroom, 
and  Adams,  once  a  month,  after  reading  a  lecture 
upon  their  vicious  and  virtuous  examples,  rewarded 
those  boys  who  had  conducted  themselves  well,  and 
caned  those  who  had  behaved  ill. 


[  i8o] 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  opinion  of  colossal  sculpture — Restorations  of  the 
paintings  at  Whitehall — Increase  of  the  value  of  modern  pictures — 
Remarkable  old  houses  and  customs — Mrs.  Nollekens'  visits — 
Ireland's  'Yortigern'— London  cries — Sir  Peter  Lely's  sale — Nolle- 
kens at  the  Academy  Club  and  at  Harrogate — His  Venus  model — 
Meanness  of  Mrs.  Nollekens — Miss  Hawkins  and  her  anecdotes. 

Nollekens  at  all  times  strongly  reprobated  colossal 
sculpture,  more  especially  when  commenced  by  the 
too  daring  student  in  the  art ;  and,  indeed,  when- 
ever anyone  led  to  the  subject,  he  would  deliver 
his  opinion,  even  to  persons  of  the  first  fashion 
and  rank,  with  as  much  freedom  as  if  he  were 
chiding  his  mason's  boy,  Kit  Finny,  for  buying" 
scanty  paunches  for  his  yard-dog  Cerberus.  '  No, 
no,  my  lord  !'  he  would  vociferate,  with  an  in- 
creased nasal  and  monotonous  tone  of  voice,  '  a 
grand  thing  don't  depend  upon  the  size,  I  can  assure 
you  of  that.  A  large  model  certainly  produces  a 
stare,  and  is  often  admired  by  ignorant  people ; 
but  the  excellence  of  a  work  of  art  has  nothing  to 
do  with  the  size,  that  you  may  depend  upon  from 
me.'  In  this  he  unquestionably  was  correct,  as 
the  graceful  elegance  of  a  Cellini  cup  or  a  bell  for 


COLOSSAL  SCULPTURE 


181 


the  Pope's  table  does  not  consist  in  immensity.  I 
have  a  cast  from  an  antique  bronze  figure  only 
three  inches  in  height,  which,  from  its  justness 
of  proportion  and  dignity  of  attitude,  strikes  the 
beholder,  when  it  is  elevated  only  nine  inches  above 
his  eye,  with  an  idea  of  its  being  a  figure  full  thirty 
feet  in  height. 

I  well  recollect  my  playfellow,  John  Deare,1  the 
sculptor,  powerfully  maintaining  that  grandeur 
never  depended  upon  magnitude.  A  preposterously 
large  figure,  like  Gog  or  Magog  in  Guildhall,  or  the 
giant  and  giantess  of  Antwerp,  would,  without 
dignity  and  breadth  of  style  and  just  proportion, 
exhibit  nothing  beyond  a  mass  of  overwhelming 
lumber.  '  What !'  he  would  exclaim,  4  is  not  that 
beautiful  gem  of  Hercules  strangling  the  lion  a 
work  of  grand  art  ?  and  that  figure  is  contained 
in  less  than  the  space  of  an  inch.'  This  is  also  my 
own  humble  opinion,  for  I  think  that  Simon's2 
Dunbar  medals,  of  which  I  have  now  some  most 
beautiful  casts  before  me,  are  quite  as  grand  as 
any  of  the  finest  busts  by  Nollekens.  I  am  quite 
certain  that  if  a  talented  medallist  were  to  execute 
a  series  of  heads  from  the  finest  of  Nollekens'  busts 
of  persons  of  the  highest  eminence,  his  labours 
wou,ld  meet  with  great  encouragement ;  but  he 
must  honestly  copy,  and  not  attempt  even  the 
slightest  alteration,  for  by  such  sophistications  he 

1  This  very  remarkable  man  was  born  at  Liverpool  in  1759,  and 
died  at  Rome  in  1795.     See  prefatory  essay. — Ed. 

2  Thomas  Simon,  chief  medallist  at  the  Mint  to  Charles  I.,  Crom- 
well, and  Charles  II.     He  was  an  artist  of  admirable  merit. — Ed. 


1 82  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

would  make  a  botched  medal,  for  which  he  never 
should,  if  I  had  my  wish,  receive  more  than  the 
weight  of  the  metal.  Many  of  Chantry's  finest 
busts  have  been  in  this  manner  most  disgracefully 
misrepresented.  That  a  figure  should  be  of  in- 
creased dimensions  the  higher  it  is  placed  above 
the  eye  of  the  spectator  is  beyond  a  doubt,  since 
if  it  were  only  the  size  of  life  it  would  dwindle  into 
insignificance,  particularly  if  placed  on  the  top  of 
the  monument  on  Fish  Street  Hill ;  for  that  pillar 
being  202  feet  in  height,  it  would  require  a  statue 
of  full  14  feet.  The  figures  of  the  Apostles  sculp- 
tured by  Bird  on  the  top  of  St.  Paul's  are  more 
than  twice  the  height  of  a  man ;  but  what  appeared 
most  astonishing  to  me  when  a  boy  was  the  enormous 
magnitude  of  the  figures  surrounding  the  apotheosis 
of  King  James  I.,  painted  upon  the  ceiling  of  White- 
hall by  Rubens. 

My  father  being  intimately  acquainted  with 
Cipriani,  took  me  up  to  the  scaffold  when  that 
artist  was  repairing  the  picture,  and  to  our  great 
astonishment  they  measured  the  enormous  height 
of  9  feet.  This  appears  hardly  credible,  as  they 
look  no  larger  than  life  when  viewed  from  the 
floor.  Upon  an  investigation,  in  consequence  of 
a  report  that  there  was  a  very  fine  copy  of  this 
work  of  Rubens  as  a  fixture  in  a  house  on  the 
south  side  of  Leicester  Fields,  I  found  that  the 
curiously  ornamented  papier-mache  parlour  ceiling 
of  No.  41  had  been  painted,  though  very  indiffer- 
ently, by  some  persons  who  had  borrowed  groups 
of  figures  from  several  of  Rubens'  designs,  which 


THE  WHITEHALL  CEILING  183 


they  had  unskilfully  combined.  This  ceiling  is 
divided  into  three  compartments ;  in  the  centre 
one  there  is  a  figure  with  a  head  resembling  King 
Charles  I.,  and  in  that  at  the  south  end  of  the  room 
is  another  of  King  James  I.,  evidently  painted  from 
recollection,  as  it  is  so  ill  done,  of  that  of  the  same 
sovereign  at  Whitehall.  I  consider  this  visit,  how- 
ever, as  well  bestowed,  since  it  may  possibly,  in 
some  measure,  set  at  rest  the  assertion  so  roundly 
and  fallaciously  propagated,  should  the  premises 
ever  be  destroyed,  and  the  loss  of  the  ceiling  be 
deplored  by  those  who  had  never  seen  it.  Cipriani 
excelled  as  a  draughtsman ;  his  style  of  colouring 
in  oil-pictures  was  rather  cold,  and  sometimes  hard, 
particularly  when  compared  with  the  luxuriantly 
sunny  glow  of  Eubens'  pictures.  However,  it  was 
a  very  profitable  employment  for  him,  as  it  is  said 
he  had  £1,000  for  repairing  it,  and  an  enormous 
sum  for  retouching  it  only.  I  verily  believe  he 
must  have  repainted  it  wholesale,  or  such  an 
amount  would  never  have  been  sanctioned  by  the 
officers  in  whom  payment  was  invested.  I  am 
quite  certain  such  a  charge  would  be  closely  looked 
into  at  present. 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  though  this  ceiling  of 
Whitehall  is  so  grand  in  its  design,  and  is,  indeed, 
I  believe,  the  only  work  of  such  magnitude  from 
the  mind  of  Rubens  in  England,  few  people,  com- 
paratively with  the  tens  of  thousands  who  pass  the 
building  daily,  know  anything  about  it.  However, 
I  consider  it  but  fair  for  the  high  reputation  of 
Rubens  as  a  colourist  to  state  that  this  picture  has 


184  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


been  restored,  repainted,  and  refreshed  not  fewer  than 
three  times. 

In  the  reign  of  King  James  II.,  1687,  Parry 
Walton,  a  painter  of  still  life,  and  Keeper  of  the 
Kind's  Pictures,  was  suffered  to  retouch  this  orand 
work  of  art,  which  then  had  been  painted  only  sixty 
years,  as  appears  by  the  Privy  Council  book,  in 
which  Mr.  Parry  Walton's  demand  of  £212  for 
its  complete  restoration  was  considered  by  Sir 
Christopher  Wren  c  as  very  modest  and  reasonable.' 
Mr.  Cipriani,  as  above  stated,  repainted  it  a  second 
time ;  and  last  of  all,  Rigaud  was  employed  to 
refresh  it. 

There  is  a  most  excellent  engraving  of  this 
ceiling,  in  three  sheets,  by  Gribelin,  the  same  artist 
who  executed  that  pretty  set  of  prints  from  the 
Cartoons,  by  Raffaelle,  at  Hampton  Court.  This 
design  of  Rubens — for,  as  it  has  been  so  often 
cleaned  and  painted  upon,  there  can  be  but  little 
of  his  colouring  visible  at  this  moment — would  still 
afford  employment  to  the  living ;  at  least,  to  the 
novelist,  who  might,  by  stating  all  its  multifarious 
vicissitudes  under  Follv's  innovations,  render  it  a 
subject  for  a  work  fully  as  entertaining  and  equally 
lucrative  as  'The  History  of  a  Guinea,'  'A  Shilling,' 
or  '  A  Gold-headed  Cane.' 

For  instance,  let  us  suppose  Rubens,  shocked  at 
the  contaminated  effect  of  his  own  canvas,  peti- 
tioning his  great  and  liberal  patron,  Charles  I.,  to 
invoke  St.  Luke  to  leave  his  easel,  and  to  order  an 
investigation  into  the  conduct  of  the  Surveyors- 
General,  commencing  with  Sir  Christopher  Wren, 


RUBENS 


and  proceeding  with  others  of  the  craft  who  have 
flourished  from  his  time  to  the  late  reign,  in  order, 
if  possible,  to  discover  how  they  could  ever  have 
sanctioned  so  barefaced  a  change.  This  inquiry 
should  be  wholly  confined  to  the  honour  of  Rubens' 
pencil,  and  in  no  degree  whatsoever  as  to  the  orders 
given  for  the  barbarously  smearing  or  refreshing, 
as  Eigaud  termed  it,  of  the  lively  portraiture  of  King- 
James  I.,  a  monarch  whom  no  one  could  possibly 
think  of  sending  to  heaven  for  his  patronage  of  the 
fine  arts  ;  nor  would  St.  Luke  be  willing  to  intro- 
duce him  there,  though  that  saint,  according  to 
Spence's  anecdote,  had  some  influence  with  St. 
Peter  when  Sir  Godfrey  Kneller  was  admitted. 

The  umpires  ought  to  consist  of  Sir  Peter  Paul's 
seven  brother  knights  of  the  pallet,  who  have 
practised  from  the  reign  of  the  above  monarch  to 
the  present  day,  viz.,  Sir  Anthony  Vandyke,  Sir 
Peter  Lely,  Sir  Godfrey  Kneller,  Sir  James  Thorn- 
hill,  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Sir  William  Beechey, 
and,  lastly,  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,  who,  like 
Rubens,  was  honoured  with  a  gold  chain  from  the 
hand  of  a  King  of  England.  By  such  chronological 
arrangement,  and  as  the  four  first-named  gentlemen 
must,  beyond  a  reprieve,  agree  to  the  execution  of 
the  culprits,  the  latter  three  would  not  be  under 
the  necessity  of  signing  for  the  rope  for  two  of  the 
scrubbers  and  smudgers.  As  several  of  those 
fraternities  which  are  now  fitly  nicknamed  '  painters 
and  glaziers '  so  impudently  recommend  old  pictures 
that  have  been  thus  '  restored,'  '  repainted,'  and  're- 


freshed '  as  the  onlv  things  worth v  the  attention  of 


1 86  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


the  man  of  fortune,  I  have  great  pleasure  in  record- 
ing the  triumph  lately  obtained  over  them  in  the 
sale  of  Lord  de  Tabley's  pictures  by  modern  Eng- 
lish artists,  which  actually  produced  twenty-five 
per  cent,  more  than  they  cost  his  lordship,  though 
they  were  purchased  of  the  artists  at  what  they 
considered  most  liberal  prices.  On  this  occasion 
the  pretenders  alluded  to  were  severely  exposed  by 
Mr.  Christie.  Mr.  Nollekens  also  died  possessed  of 
three  pictures  by  an  English  artist,  Eichard  Wilson, 
which  cost  his  father-in-law,  Mr.  Welch,  only  about 
a  tenth  part  of  the  sum  the  said  Mr.  Christie  sold 
them  for. 

One  spring  morning,  as  I  was  passing  through 
Covent  Garden,  I  was  accosted  by  Mrs.  Elizabeth 
Carter,  who  had  accompanied  Mrs.  Nollekens 
thither  for  the  purpose  of  purchasing  some  roots 
of  dandelion,  an  infusion  of  which  had  been  strongly 
recommended  to  her  husband  by  Dr.  Jebb.  Twigg, 
the  fruiterer,  to  whom  Mr.  Justice  Welch,  during 
his  magistracy,  had  often  been  kind,  was  at  all 
times  gratefully  attentive  to  Miss  Welch  and  her 
sister,  Mrs.  Nollekens.  He  procured  the  roots  she 
wanted  from  that  class  of  people  called  4  simplers,' 
who  sit  in  the  centre  of  the  Garden.  The  fruiterer 
was  a  talkative  man,  and  was  called  by  some  of  his 
jocular  friends  the  '  Twig  of  the  Garden';  he  had 
been  cook  at  the  Shakespeare  Tavern,  and  knew  all 
the  wits  and  eccentric  characters  of  his  early  days. 

Mrs.  Carter,  though  she  was  seldom  fond  of 
noticing  strangers,  fell  by  degrees  into  a  conver- 
sation with  Twigg,  and  asked  him  which  house  it 


TWIGG,  THE  FRUITERER  187 


was  in  Tavistock  Row  that  Miss  Wray,  who  was 
shot  by  the  Rev.  James  Hackman,  occupied  before 
she  resided  with  Lord  Sandwich  ;  to  which  he 
replied :  c  It  was  that  on  the  south-west  corner  of 
Tavistock  Court,  next  to  the  one  in  which  the 
famous  William  Vandevelde,  the  marine-painter, 
died.'1  This  corner  house,  No.  4,  is  now  occupied 
by  a  tailor  ;  and  that  in  which  Vandevelde  lived, 
now  No.  5,  is  inhabited  by  Irish  Johnstone,  as  he 
is  usually  called,  that  once  delightful  singer  and 
excellent  actor  of  the  characters  of  Irishmen. 
'  Pray,'  continued  the  lady,  '  which  was  Zincke's,2 
the  celebrated  enameller's  ?'  '  Why,  ma'am,'  said 
he,  4  it  is  No.  13,  that  in  which  Mr.  Nathaniel 
Dance,  the  painter,  afterwards  lived.  Meyer, 
another  famous  miniature-painter,  resided  in  it,  and 
the  garrets  are  now  occupied  by  Peter  Pindar 
(Dr.  Wolcot).  I  recollect,  ma'am,'  continued  the 
fruiterer,  '  old  Joe,  who  was  the  first  person  who 
sold  flowers  in  this  Garden  ;  his  stand  was  at  that 
corner  within  the  enclosure,  then  called  Primrose 
Hill,  opposite  to  Low's  Hotel.  This  spot  was  so 
named  in  consequence  of  its  being  the  station  of 
those  persons  who  brought  primroses  to  the  Garden. 
Low  had  been  a  hairdresser  in  Tavistock  Street 
before  he  took  that  large  house,  which  he  estab- 
lished as  a  family  hotel,  the  earliest  of  that  de- 
scription in  London,  where  he  distributed  medals, 
which  procured  him  many  lodgers.' 

1  On  April  6,  1707.— Ed. 

2  Christian    Friedrich    Zincke     (1684-1767),    cabinet  -  painter    to 
Frederick,  Prince  of  Wales. — Ed. 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Mrs.  Nollekens   then  requested  to  know  which 
house  it  was  in  James  Street  where  her  father's 
old    friend,    Mr.    Charles    Grignon,    resided,    the 
engraver    so  extensively   and   for    so    many   years 
employed  upon  the  designs  of  Gravelot,  Hayman, 
and   Wale.     '  No.   27,'   said    Twigg  ;    '  I    recollect 
the  old  house  when  it  was  a   shop    inhabited   by 
two    old   Frenchwomen,   who   came    over   here   to 
chew   paper   for   the   papier-mache  people.'     Mrs. 
Nollekens  :    '  Eidiculous  !     I  think  Mr.  Nollekens 
once  told  me  that  the  elder  Wilton,  Lady  Chambers' 
grandfather,  was  the  person  who  employed  people 
from   France  to  work  in  the  papier-mache  manu- 
factory which   he    established   in    Edward    Street, 
Cavendish  Square.'      Twigg :    '  I   can  assure    you, 
ma'am,    these    women    bought    the    paper-cuttings 
from  the  stationers  and  bookbinders  and  produced 
it  in  that  way,  in  order  to  keep  it  a  secret,  before 
they  used  our  machine  for  mashing  it.'    Mrs.  Carter  : 
•  I  recollect,  sir,  when  Mr.  Garrick  acted,  hackney- 
chairs  were  then  so  numerous  that  they  stood  all 
round  the  Piazzas,  down  Southampton  Street,  and 
extended  more  than  half-way  along  Maiden  Lane, 
so    much    were  they   in  requisition  at  that   time.' 
Twigg :  ■  Then  I  suppose,  ma'am,  you  also  recollect 
the  shoeblacks  at  every  corner  of  the  streets,  whose 
cry  was  "Black  your  shoes,  your  honour  ?"       '  Yes, 
sir,  perfectly  well  ;    and   the    clergyman   of    your 
parish  walking  about  and  visiting  the  fruit-shops  in 
the  Garden  in  his  canonicals.     And  I  likewise  re- 
member a  very  portly  woman  sitting  at  her  fruit- 
stall  in  a  dress  of  lace,  which  it  was  said  cost  at 


CARD-PARTIES  189 


least  one  hundred  guineas,  though  a  greater  sum 
was  often  mentioned.' 

Here  this  dialogue  about  old  times  ended,  by  the 
entrance  of  several  other  customers,  upon  which 
Mrs.  Carter  and  Mrs.  Nollekens  left  the  shop  to 
pay  a  morning  visit  to  Mrs.  Garrick,  and  I  made 
my  bow. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  uncultivated  manners  were  at 
times  so  truly  disagreeable  to  his  sister-in-law, 
Miss  Welch — whose  talents  were  highly  appreciated 
by  the  literati  of  the  day — that  whenever  she  re- 
ceived her  friends  at  a  card-party  he  was  seldom 
invited;  but  Mrs.  Nollekens,  whom  her  sister  was 
very  fond  of  showing  off,  always  attended  them. 
To  please  her  economical  husband  she  would  appear 
to  acquiesce  in  his  opinion,  that  her  shape  was  better 
shown  by  a  close  simple  dress  ;  for,  in  doing  this,  she 
could  save  a  shilling  in  coach-hire,  by  going  early 
in  a  plain  gown,  time  enough  to  dress  at  her  sister's, 
where  she  had  by  slow  degrees  conveyed  various 
articles  of  finery,  until  she  had  lodged  a  pretty 
good  wardrobe  in  one  of  the  spare  upper  closets. 
Upon  entering  the  drawing-room  close  behind  those 
who  had  last  knocked,  her  name  was  announced  as 
if  just  arrived,  and  she  has  been  seen  to  make  as 
formal  a  curtsey  to  her  sister  as  to  the  rest  of  the 
party. 

At  these  ceremonious  card-parties  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens, who,  the  reader  will  recollect,  played  the 
strict  Hoyle  game,  would  remain  till  she  found 
herself  in  possession  of  more  than  she  sat  down 
with,  and  then  inquired  if  her  servant  were  below. 


190  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Poor  Bronze  then  attended  her  to  the  upper 
chamber,  where,  after  changing  her  dress,  she 
remained  in  her  camlet- cloak  till  the  whole  of  the 
visitors  were  gone,  and  then  the  foot  which  had  been 
that  evening  graced  with  a  silver- spangled  slipper 
was  pressed  into  a  wooden  clog.  Thus  equipped, 
Mrs.  Nollekens,  on  leaving  the  house,  placed  her 
delicately-formed  arm  upon  that  of  her  faithful 
servant,  whose  swarthy  hue  her  mistress  could 
scarcely  by  daylight  bear  to  look  upon,  but  upon 
these  occasions  she  condescended  to  rest  upon  her 
with  perfect  confidence. 

Nollekens  was  at  times  so  ridiculously  soft  that, 
in  several  instances,  he  approached  what  was 
formerly  called  the  'Colley-Molley'  class  of  beings 
— men  who  were  fond  of  lacing  the  stays  and  carry- 
ing the  fans  or  pattens  of  their  spouses,  whose 
character  is  so  admirably  portrayed  by  Foote  in 
his  'Jerry  Sneak.'  In  the  exercise  of  some  of  his 
accommodating  attentions  to  the  will  of  his  fair 
partner,  his  good-natured  weakness  exposed  him  to 
the  notice  of  a  friend,  who  was  induced  to  watch 
him  one  night  in  Bloom sbury  Square  dangling  a 
lantern  in  attendance  upon  his  wife  and  her  sister 
Miss  Welch,  on  their  economical  pedestrian  return 
home  from  a  formal  cribbage-party. 

Nollekens,  anxious  to  get  home  to  bed,  was 
generally  foremost,  and  often  proceeded,  though 
with  a  toddling  gait,  so  much  too  fast  for  the 
clogged  ladies  behind  him  that  Mrs.  Nollekens 
was  often  heard  to  cry,  c  Stop,  sir,  pray  stop  !'  but 
Miss  Welch  of  late   years   seldom    spoke  to  him. 


SAMUEL  IRELAND  191 


He  would  then  with  clue  obedience  slacken  his  pace 
into  a  dawdling  creep,  suffer  them  to  pass,  and  lag 
so  considerably  behind  that  he  was  now  and  then 
openly  and  roundly  charged  with  indulging  in  a  nap. 
Upon  these  occasions  they  thought  it  wisest  to  wait 
his  coming  up  with  the  lantern,  upon  pretence  of 
seeing  that  all  the  umbrellas  were  safe  under  his 
arm  ;  but  in  reality  for  fear  of  a  rude  embrace 
from  some  boisterous  perambulator  of  the  streets, 
under  the  influence  of  Bacchus  or  Thrale's  Entire  ; 
and  whenever  there  was  a  wide  puddle  to  cross, 
Mrs.  Nollekens  always  made  a  point  of  seeing 
her  husband  safe  over  first,  by  insisting  upon 
his  maintaining  a  proper  precedence  on  such 
occasions. 

Samuel  Ireland1  had  entreated  Mrs.  Nollekens  to 
persuade  her  husband  to  go  to  the  representation  of 
what  he  called  Shakespeare's  play  of  '  Vortigern  '; 
and  when  he  informed  her  that  my  father  and  I 
were  going,  she  acquiesced,  fully  relying  upon  our 
taking  care  of  him.  The  crowds  which  had 
assembled  at  the  doors  of  Drury  Lane  Theatre 
long  before  the  hours  of  admission  were  immense, 
and  the  anxiety  of  Ireland  for  the  success  of  the 
play  was  so  great  that  he  caused  a  hand-bill  to  be 
printed  and  thrown  crumpled  up  by  hundreds  among 
the  people  ;  and  as  that  bill  is  now  esteemed  rather 
a  rare  theatrical  relic,  the  reader  is  presented  with 
a  copy  of  one  which  fell  to  my  lot. 

1  Samuel  William  Henry  Ireland,  who  wrote  the  spurious  tragedy 
of  'Vortigern'  (1777-1835).  He  was  the  son  of  another  Samuel 
Ireland  (1750-1800),  the  author  of  'Picturesque  Tours.'— Ed. 


192  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

'"VORTIGERN." 

4  A  malevolent  and  impotent  attack  on  the  Shakspeare  MSS.  having 
appeared  on  the  eve  of  representation  of  the  play  of  "  Vortigern," 
evidently  intended  to  injure  the  interest  of  the  proprietor  of  the 
MSS.,  Mr.  Ireland  feels  it  impossible,  within  the  short  space  of  time 
that  intervenes  between  the  publishing  and  the  representation,  to 
produce  an  answer  to  the  most  illiberal  and  unfounded  assertions  in 
Mr.  Malone's  inquiry.  He  is  therefore  induced  to  request  that  the 
play  of  "  Vortigern  "  may  be  heard  with  that  candour  that  has  ever 
distinguished  a  British  audience. 

t  #^#  The  play  is  now  at  the  press,  and  will  in  a  very  few  days  be 
laid  before  the  public' 

After  great  patience  and  much  crowding  we 
moved  in,  and,  when  safely  seated  in  the  pit,  con- 
gratulated ourselves  upon  the  possession  of  our 
shoes  ;  whilst  Mr.  Nollekens  recognised  Miles 
Petit  Andrews,  Flaxman,  and  several  others  whom 
he  knew.  The  play  went  on  pretty  well  until 
Kemble  appeared,  when  the  noise  of  disapprobation 
commenced,  and  being  considered  by  the  audience 
as  an  atrocious  fraud,  it  was  at  length  completely 
condemned. 

Frequently  when  Mr.  Nollekens  has  been  model- 
ling, he  has  imitated  the  cries  of  the  itinerant 
venders  as  they  were  passing  by.  I  recollect  the 
cries  of  two  men  pleasing  him  so  extravagantly 
that  he  has  continued  to  hum  their  notes  for  days 
together,  even  when  he  has  been  engaged  with  his 
sitters,  measurino;  the  stone  in  the  vard  for  a  bust 
or  a  figure,  feeding  the  dog,  putting  up  the  bar 
of  the  gate,  or  improving  the  attitudes  of  his 
Venuses. 

The  late  Dr., Kitchener,  whose  musical  powers 
were     so     very    generally    acknowledged,    kindly 


MUSICAL  CRIES 


193 


condescended  to  note  down  the  following  music  of 
these  cries,  from  my  recollection,  whereby  I  am 
enabled  to  gratify  the  reader  with  the  very  sound 
itself.1 


iSiHa 


Buy  a  Bowl,  Dish,  or  a  Platter  ;  come  buy  my  Wood-en  Ware. 


!iH!^i 


0 — #- 


5=fc 


^a 


^fi^pgyi^a^sg 


Buy   an   Al  -  ma-nack,  a  Sheet  Al-ma-nack,  or  a  Book  Al-ma-nack. 


M,f   H^t 


=£z* 


In  a  copy  of  Hawkins'  '  History  of  Music,'  in 
the  British  Museum,  at  page  75  in  the  fifth  volume, 
there  is  the  following  manuscript  note  respecting 
the  famous  Tom  Britton,  the  musical  small-coal 
man.2     l  The  goodness  of  his  ear  directed  him  to 

1  During  the  last  nine  years  Dr.  Kitchiner  wrote  the  following 
works  :  '  Economy  of  the  Eyes '  (Part  I.,  '  Of  Spectacles ' ;  Part  II., 
!  Of  Telescopes '),  '  The  Cook's  Oracle,'  l  Art  of  Invigorating  Life,' 
'  Observations  on  Singing/  '  National  Songs  of  England,'  l  Life  and 
Sea-Songs  of  Dibdin,' '  Housekeeper's  Ledger,'  '  Century  of  Surgeons,' 
4  Traveller's  Oracle.'  The  Doctor  composed  and  selected  the  music  of 
the  opera  of  'Ivanhoe'  for  Covent  Garden  Theatre,  composed  the 
whole  of  the  music  for  'Love  among  the  Roses,'  for  the  English 
Opera,  •  Fifty  English  Ballads,'  '  An  Universal  Prayer,'  '  The  Hymn 
of  Faith,'  '  The  English  Grace,'  and  '  The  Lord's  Prayer.'  Number 
sold,  55,250  volumes.— Smith.  Dr.  William  Kitchiner,  born  in  1775, 
died  1827.— Ed. 

2  Born  1654,  died  1714.— Ed. 

13 


i94  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

the  use  of  the  most  perfect  of  all  musical  intervals, 
the  diapason  or  octave,  his  cry  being,  as  some 
relate  that  remember  it : 


Small  Coal. 

The  public  have  frequently  been  amused  at  the 
theatres  by  actors  who  have  mimicked  the  cries  of 
London.  I  remember  hearing  Baddeley  whine  the 
cry  of  '  Periwinkles,  a  wine-quart  a  penny,  peri- 
winkles. Come  buy  my  shrimps,  come  buy  my 
shrimps  ;  a  crab,  will  you  buy  a  crab  ?'  I  have 
also  heard  that  excellent  comedian  John  Bannister 
cry: 

1  Come,  neighbours,  see  and  buy  ;  here's 
Your  long  and  strong  scarlet  ware  ; 
Scarlet  garters  twopence  a  pair, 
Twopence  a  pair  !  twopence  a  pair  !' 

Upon  my  mentioning  this  to  Mr.  Bannister,  he 
did  not  immediately  recollect  it ;  though  in  a  few 
moments  he  said  :  c  You  are  right,  and  it  was  at  the 
Little  Theatre  in  the  Haymarket.  Did  you  ever, 
my  good  fellow,  hear  of  Ned  Shuter's  imitations  of 
the  London  cries  ?  He  was  the  most  famous  chap 
at  that'  sort  of  thing  ;  indeed,  so  fond  of  it  that  he 
would  frequently  follow  people  for  hours  together 
to  get  their  cries  correctly.  I  recollect  a  story 
which  he  used  to  tell  of  his  following  a  man  who 
had  a  peculiar  cry,  up  one  street  and  down  another, 
nearly  a  whole  day  to  get  his  cry,  but  the  man 
never  once  cried  ;  at  last,  being  quite  out  of  temper, 
he   went  up  to  the  fellow,  and  said,  "  You  don't 


OLD  CORKS  195 


cry  ;  why  the  devil  don't  you  cry  ?"  The  man 
answered  in  a  piteous  tone,  "  Cry  !  Lord  bless  your 
heart,  sir,  I  can't  cry  ;  my  vifes  dead  ;  she  died 
this  morning." ' 

Besides  the  musical  cries  mentioned  above  about 
sixty  years  back,  there  were  also  two  others  yet 
more  singular,  which,  however,  were  probably 
better  known  in  the  villages  round  London  than  in 
the  Metropolis  itself.  The  first  of  these  was  used 
by  an  itinerant  dealer  in  corks,  sometimes  called 
Old  Corks,  who  rode  upon  an  ass,  and  carried  his 
wares  in  panniers  on  each  side  of  him.  He  sat  with 
much  dignity,  and  wore  upon  his  head  a  velvet  cap ; 
and  his  attractive  cry,  which  was  partly  spoken  and 
partly  sung,  but  all  in  metre,  was  something  like 
the  following  fragment : 

Spoken.  *  Corks  for  sack 

I  have  at  my  back  ; 
Sung.        All  bandy,  all  handy  ; 

Some  for  wine  and  some  for  brandy. 
Spoken.     Corks  for  cholic- water, 

Cut  'em  a  little  shorter  ; 

Corks  for  gin, 

Very  thin  ; 

Corks  for  rum, 

As  big  as  my  thumb  ; 

Corks  for  ale, 

Long  and  pale ; 
Sung.        They're  all  handy,  all  handy, 

Some  for  wine  and  some  for  brandy.' 

The  other  cry,  which  was  much  more  musical, 
was  that  of  two  persons,  father  and  son,  who  sold 
lines.  The  father,  in  a  strong,  clear  tenor,  would 
begin  the  strain  in  the  major  key,  and  when  he  had 


196  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

finished,  his  son,  who  followed  at  a  short  distance 
behind  him,  in  a  shrill  falsetto,  would  repeat  it  in 
the  minor,  and  their  call  consisted  of  the  following 
words  : 

'  Buy  a  white-line, 
Or  a  jack-line, 
Or  a  clock-line, 
Or  a  hair-line, 

Or  a  line  for  your  clothes  here.' 

In  order  to  render  this  little  work  a  book  of 
reference  to  the  London  topographer  as  well  as  to 
the  historian,  I  have  occasionally  given,  and  shall 
continue  to  give,  the  residences  of  persons  of 
notoriety,  as  well  as  their  places  of  birth,  death, 
and  burial — points  which,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  are 
not  always  attended  to  by  biographers. 

The  house  in  Great  Queen  Street,  now  divided 
into  two,  Nos.  55  and  56,  was  that  in  which  Hudson 
lived  ;  it  was  afterwards  the  last  habitation  of  Wor- 
lidge,1  the  etcher,  who  died  in  it.  Hoole,  the  trans- 
lator of  Tasso,  and  the  beloved  friend  of  Dr. 
Johnson,  next  resided  in  it,  and  he  was  succeeded 
by  Eichard  Brinsley  Sheridan,  who,  after  Garrick's 
funeral,  passed  there  the  remainder  of  the  day  in 
silence  with  a  few  select  friends.  It  was  lately 
inhabited  by  Mr.  Chippendale.2  This  house  is  one 
of  those  built  after  a  design  of  Inigo  Jones,  and 
still  retains  much  of  its  original  architecture. 

The  street  was  named  Queen  Street  in  compli- 
ment to    Henrietta  Maria.     '  My   old   friend,'   Mr. 

1  Thomas  Worlidge  (1700-1766),  called  '  Scritch-scratch,'  an  imitator 
of  Rembrandt. — Ed. 

2  Thomas  Chippendale,  the  famous  cabinet-maker. — Ed. 


CO  VENT  GARDEN  197 


Batridge,  the  barber,  as  Mr.  Hone  in  his  '  Every- 
day Book '  has  been  pleased  to  called  him,  in- 
formed me  that  he  very  well  recollected  the  gate- 
entrance  into  Great  Queen  Street  from  Drury  Lane. 
It  was  under  a  house,  and  was  so  long  and  dark 
that  it  received  the  fearful  appellation  of  '  Hell 
Gate.'  Through  this  gate  the  Dukes  of  Newcastle 
and  Ancaster  drove  to  their  houses  in  Lincoln's  Inn 
Fields,  at  that  time  the  seat  of  fashion  ;  which  can 
readily  be  conceived,  when  the  reader  recollects 
that  Grosvenor  Square  was  building  when  Mr. 
Nollekens  was  a  little  boy. 

Co  vent  Garden  was  the  first  square  inhabited  by 
the  great ;  for  immediately  upon  the  completion  of 
the  houses  on  the  north  and  east  sides  of  Covent 
Garden,  which  were  all  that  were  uniformly  built 
after  the  design  of  Inigo  Jones,  they  were  every  one 
of  them  inhabited  by  persons  of  the  first  title  and 
rank,  as  appears  by  the  parish  books  of  the  rates  at 
that  time. 

The  chambers  occupied  by  Richard  Wilson  were 
portions  of  the  house  successively  inhabited  by  Sir 
Peter  Lely,  Sir  Godfrey  Kneller,  and  Sir  James 
Thornhill  ;  and,  by  way  of  rather  a  curious  treat 
to  the  connoisseur,  I  shall  insert  the  advertisement 
for  the  sale  of  Sir  Peter  Lely's  collection  of  works 
of  art,  which  I  copied  from  the  London  Gazette  of 
February  16,  1687  : 

'  Upon  Mod  day,  in  Easter-week,  will  be  exposed  by  Public  Auction 
a  most  curious  and  valuable  collection  of  Drawings  and  Prints,  made 
with  great  expense  and  care  by  Sir  Peter  Lely,  Painter  to  his  Majesty. 
The  Drawings  are  all  of  the  most  eminent  Masters  of  Italy,  being 


198  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

originals  and  most  curiously  preserved.  The  Prints  are  all  the  works 
of  Mark  Antoine,  after  Raphael,  and  the  other  best  Italian  Masters, 
and  of  the  best  impressions  and  proof  prints  in  good  condition  and 
curiously  preserved,  some  are  double  and  treble. 

'  The  Sale  will  be  at  the  house  in  Covent  Garden,  where  Sir  Peter 
Lely  lived.'1 

Covent  Garden  even  so  late  as  Pope's  time 
retained  its  fashion,  as  may  be  seen  by  the  following 
extract  from  the  Morning  Advertiser  for  March  6, 
1730: 

■s 

'  The  Lady  Wortley  Montague,  who  has  been  greatly  indisposed  at 
her  house  in  Covent  Garden  for  some  time,  is  now  perfectly  recovered, 
and  takes  the  benefit  of  the  air  in  Hyde  Park  every  morning,  by 
advice  of  her  physicians.' 

The  tracing  out  and  examining  the  peculiar 
manners  and  customs  of  the  inhabitants  and  visitors 
of  the  parish  of  St.  Paul,  Covent  Garden,  is  a  source 
of  knowledge  of  considerable  importance  to  every 
class  of  historian,  both  on  account  of  the  immense 
number  of  persons  of  the  highest  rank  and  title, 
as  well  as  artists  of  the  very  first  eminence,  who  at 
one  time  rendered  it  the  most,  and,  indeed,  the  only, 
fashionable  part  of  the  town  ;  and  also  from  the 
immense  concourse  of  wits,  literary  characters,  and 
other  men  of  genius,  who  frequented  the  various 
and  numerous  coffee-houses,  wine  and  cider  cellars, 
jelly-shops,  etc.,  within  its  boundaries,  the  list  of 
whom  particularly  includes  the  eminent  names  of 
Butler,  Addison,  Sir  Kichard  Steele,  Otway,  Dryden, 
Pope,  Warburton,  Cibber,  Fielding,  Churchill, 
Bolingbroke,    and    Dr.    Samuel    Johnson ;     Kich, 

1  It  was  not  the  custom  formerly  to  mention  the  name  of  the 
auctioneer  in  advertisements  of  sales. — Smith. 


INHABITANTS  OF  COVENT  GARDEN  199 

Woodward,  Booth,  Wilkes,  Garrick,  and  Macklin  ; 
Kitty  Clive,  Peg  Woffington,  Mrs.  Pritchard,  the 
Duchess  of  Bolton,  Lady  Derby,  Lady  Thurlow, 
and  the  present  Duchess  of  St.  Albans  ;  Sir  Peter 
Lely,  Sir  Godfrey  Kneller,  and  Sir  James  Thorn- 
hill  ;  Vandevelde,  Zincke,  Lambert,  Hay  man, 
Hogarth,  Wilson,  Dance,  Meyer,  etc. 

The  diversified  pleasure  of  procuring  this  infor- 
mation from  numerous  authentic  sources,  both 
written  and  related,  together  with  several  curious 
events  which  have  fallen  under  my  own  observation, 
has  occupied  many  years  of  my  early  life  ;  and  I 
now  find  myself  in  possession  of  a  truly  interesting 
mass  of  intelligence,  sufficiently  extensive  for  a 
publication  of  two  volumes,  containing  some  curious 
collections  towards  the  history  of  that  most  fre- 
quented of  parishes,  which  I  hope,  writh  the  blessing 
of  health  and  continuance  of  memory  (for  the 
possession  of  which  organ  the  friendly  Dr.  Spurz- 
heim  has  given  me  some  credit),  to  live  to  see 
published. 

But  at  present  I  must  not  lose  sight  of  Mr. 
Nollekens.  He  for  many  years  made  one  at  the 
table  of  what  was  at  this  time  called  the  Royal 
Academy  Club  ;  and  so  strongly  was  he  bent  upon 
saving  all  he  could  privately  conceal,  that  he  did 
not  mind  paying  two  guineas  a  year  for  his  ad- 
mission-ticket in  order  to  indulge  himself  with  a 
few  nutmegs,  which  he  contrived  to  pocket 
privately  ;  for  as  red-wine  negus  was  the  principal 
beverage,  nutmegs  were  used.  Now,  it  generally 
happened,  if   another   bowl   was   wanted,  that  the 


200  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

nutmegs  were  missing.  Nollekens,  who  had  fre- 
quently been  seen  to  pocket  them,  was  one  day 
requested  by  Rossi,  the  sculptor,  to  see  if  they  had 
not  fallen  under  the  table  ;  upon  which  Nollekens 
actually  went  crawling  beneath  upon  his  hands  and 
knees  pretending  to  look  for  them,  though  at  that 
very  time  they  were  in  his  waistcoat-pocket.  He 
was  so  old  a  stager  at  this  monopoly  of  nutmegs 
that  he  would  sometimes  engage  the  maker  of  the 
negus  in  conversation,  looking  at  him  full  in  the 
face,  whilst  he  slyly  and  unobserved,  as  he  thought, 
conveyed  away  the  spice  ;  like  the  fellow  who  is 
stealing  the  bank-note  from  the  blind  man  in  that 
admirable  print  of  c  The  Royal  Cock-pit,'  by 
Hogarth. 

I  believe  it  is  generally  considered  that  those  who 
are  miserlv  in  their  own  houses,  almost  to  a  state  of 
starvation,  when  they  visit  their  friends  or  dine  in 
public,  but  particularly  when  they  are  travelling, 
and  know  that  they  will  be  called  upon  with  a  pretty 
long  bill,  are  accustomed  to  lay  in  what  they  call  a 
good  stock  of  everything,  or  of  all  the  good  things 
the  landlord  thinks  proper  to  spread  before  them. 
This  was  certainly  the  case  with  Nollekens  when 
he  visited  Harrogate  in  order  to  take  the  water 
for  his  diseased  mouth.  He  informed  his  wife  that 
he  took  three  half -pints  of  water  at  a  time,  and  as 
he  knew  the  bills  would  be  pretty  large  at  the  inn, 
he  was  determined  to  indulge  in  the  good  things  of 
this  world  ;  so  that  one  day  he  managed  to  get 
through  c  a  nice  roast  chicken,  with  two  nice  tarts 
and  some  nice  jellies.'     Another  day  he  took  nearly 


MISS  COLEMAN,  THE  MODEL  201 

two  pounds  of  venison,  the  fat  of  which  was  at 
least  '  two  inches  thick  ' ;  at  breakfast  he  always 
managed  two  muffins,  and  got  through  a  plate  of 
toast,  and  he  took  good  care  to  put  a  French  roll  in 
his  pocket,  for  fear  he  should  find  himself  hungry 
when  he  was  walking  on  the  common  by  himself. 

Our  sculptor  would  sometimes  amuse  himself  on 
a  summer's  evening  by  standing  with  his  arms 
behind  him  at  the  yard-gate,  which  opened  into 
Titchfield  Street.  During  one  of  these  indulgences, 
as  a  lady  wras  passing,  most  elegantly  dressed, 
attended  by  a  strapping  footman  in  silver-laced 
livery,  with  a  tall  gilt-headed  cane,  she  nodded  to 
him,  and  smilingly  asked  him  if  he  did  not  know 
her.  On  his  reply  that  he  did  not  recollect  her, 
'  What,  sir  !'  exclaimed  she,  c  do  you  forget  Miss 
Coleman,  who  brought  a  letter  to  you  from  Charles 
Townley  to  show  legs  with  your  Venus  !  Why,  I 
have  been  with  you  twenty  times  in  that  little  room 
to  stand  for  your  Venus  !'  '  Oh,  lauk-a-daisy,  so 
you  have  !'  answered  Nollekens.  '  Why,  what  a 
fine  woman  you're  grown !  Come,  walk  in,  and  I'll 
show  you  your  figure  ;  I  have  done  it  in  marble.' 

After  desiring  the  man  to  stop  at  the  gate,  she 
went  in  with  him  ;  and  upon  seeing  Mrs.  Nollekens 
at  the  parlour-window,  who  was  pretending  to  talk 
to  and  feed  her  sister's  bullfinch,  but  who  had  been 
informed  by  the  vigilant  and  suspicious  Bronze  of 
what  had  been  going  on  at  the  gate,  she  went  up  to 

her,    and   said  :     '  Madam,    I   have   to   thank ' 

Mrs.  Nollekens  then  elevated  herself  on  her  toes, 
and  with  a  lisping  palpitation  began  to  address  the 


202  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

lady.  'Oh  dear!'  observed  Miss  Coleman,  'and 
you  don't  know  me  ?  You  have  given  me  many  a 
basin  of  broth  in  the  depth  of  winter  when  I  used 
to  stand  for  Venus.'  Mrs.  Nollekens,  not  knowing 
what  to  think  of  Joseph,  shook  her  head  at  him  as 
she  slammed  the  window,  at  the  same  time  ex- 
claiming :  'Oh  fie,  Mr.  Nollekens,  fie,  fie!'  Bronze 
assured  me  that  when  her  master  went  into  the 
front-parlour  he  had  a  pretty  warm  reception. 
'  What!'  said  her  mistress,  '  to  know  such  wretches 
after  you  have  done  with  them  in  your  studio  !' 
The  truth  is  that  Mrs.  Nollekens  certainly  did 
contrive  to  get  a  little  broth  ready  for  the  models, 
such  as  it  was,  and  she  likewise  condescended  to 
take  it  into  the  room  herself  ;  and  this,  I  am  sorry 
to  say,  whatever  her  motives  or  other  charitable 
intentions  might  have  been,  is  the  only  thing  I  can 
relate  of  her  that  bears  the  semblance  of  kindness. 

It  is  probable  that  Mrs.  Nollekens  never  ex- 
perienced that  inexpressible  delight  which  diffuses 
itself  through  the  benevolent  heart  when  alleviating 
the  wants  of  others.  Indeed,  she  would  often 
remain  at  the  window  looking  over  the  blind,  and 
tantalizing  the  piteous  supplicants  who  every 
moment  expected  relief  from  her  hand  ;  and  she 
would  indulge  in  this  practice  that  passers-by 
might  suppose  the  inhabitants  of  the  mansion  to  be 
charitably  inclined.  One  winter  morning,  when 
the  weather  was  so  severe  that  the  blackbirds  fell 
from  the  branches,  two  miserable  men,  almost 
dying  for  want  of  nourishment,  implored  her 
charitable    aid  ;  but  little   did   the   unhappy  men- 


PARSIMONY  OF  MRS.  NOLLEKENS  203 

dicants  suppose  that  the  only  heart  which  sym- 
pathized in  their  afflictions  was  that  of  Betty,  in 
the  kitchen,  who  silently  crept  upstairs  and  cheer- 
fully gave  them  her  mite. 

At  this  delicate  rebuke  Mrs.  Nollekens  hastily 
opened  the  parlour-door,  and  vociferated :  '  Betty, 
Betty,  there  is  a  bone  below  with  little  or  no  meat 
on  it  ;  give  it  the  poor  creatures  !'  upon  which  the 
one  who  had  hitherto  spoken,  steadfastly  looking  in 
the  face  of  his  pale  partner  in  distress,  repeated  : 
c  Bill,  we  are  to  have  a  bone  with  little  or  no  meat 
on  it.'  When  they  were  gone,  the  liberal-hearted 
Betty  was  seriously  rated  by  her  mistress,  who  was 
quite  certain  she  would  come  to  want.  '  What 
good  will  your  wages  do  you,  child,  if  you  give 
alms  so  often  to  such  people  ?  Dr.  Johnson  has 
done  all  our  servants  more  injury  by  that  constant 
practice  of  his  of  giving  charity,  as  it  is  called,  than 
he  is  aware  of,  and  I  shall  take  an  opportunity  of 
telling  him  so  when  I  next  see  him  at  Sir  John 
Hawkins' ;  and  T  know  Sir  John  and  all  his  family 
will  be  on  my  side,  for  they  are  far  from  being 
extravagant  people.' 

My  worthy  friend,  the  late  Dr.  Hill,  assured  me 
that  a  gentleman  of  the  faculty,  who  lectured  upon 
medical  electricity,  and  gave  advice  gratis  to  the 
poor  twice  a  week  at  his  house  in  Bond  Street,  was 
visited  by  a  woman  dressed  shabbily -genteel,  who 
received  the  shock,  until  one  of  the  patients  in- 
formed the  doctor  that  she  was  no  less  a  person 
than  Mrs.  Nollekens,  the  wife  of  the  famous 
sculptor.     He  was  therefore  determined  to  expose 


204  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

her  the  next  day  by  getting  all  the  poor  into  the 
room  before  she  was  admitted  ;  and  what  her  shock 
was  may  easily  be  conceived,  if  we  allow  her  to 
have  possessed  common  feeling. 

When  she  was  seated  in  the  electrical  chair  in 
the  centre  of  the  room,  the  doctor  stood  before  her, 
and,  making  her  a  profound  bow,  addressed  her  as 
Mrs.  Nollekens.  '  I  wonder,  madam,'  said  he,  '  that 
a  lady  of  your  fortune,  and  the  wife  of  a  Koyal 
Academician,  could  think  of  passing  yourself  off  as 
a  pauper — you,  who  ought  to  enable  me  to  relieve 
these  poor  people.  You  are  welcome,  madam,  to 
the  assistance  which  I  have  given  you  ;  but  I  hope 
and  trust  that  you  will  now  distribute  the  amount 
of  my  fees  from  persons  in  your  station  to  your 
distressed  fellow- creatures  around  you  in  this  room.' 
Mrs.  Nollekens,  after  this  electrifying  shock,  dis- 
tributed the  contents  of  her  purse,  which,  un- 
fortunately, on  this  occasion  amounted  only  to  a 
few  shillings,  though  she  left  the  room  with  a 
promise  to  send  more.  After  this  reproof,  how- 
ever, she  was  noticed  to  dress  a  little  better,  and  to 
walk  with  her  high-caned  parasol  as  usual. 

Mrs.  Nollekens  was  not  very  fond  of  Miss 
Hawkins  ;  she  said  that  she  was  always  giving  her 
tongue  liberties  when  speaking  of  Dr.  Johnson, 
and  whenever  Mr.  Boswell's  name  was  mentioned 
she  would  throw  herself  into  such  a  rage,  because 
that  gentleman  had  asserted  that  Sir  John  Hawkins, 
her  father,  was  the  son  of  a  carpenter. 

Poor  Mrs.  Nollekens  !  what  would  she  have  said 
had  she  lived  to  have  seen  the  three  volumes  of 


M/SS  HA  WKINS?  GOSSIP  205 

1  Anecdotes,'  in  one  of  which  Miss  Hawkins  says  : 
1  Now,  as  to  the  carpenter's  son,  I  am  almost 
shocked  at  using  lightly  a  term  that  exists  in  Holy 
Writ'?  But  in  my  humble  opinion,  as  she  was  not 
unconscious  of  overstepping  sacred  bounds,  she 
ought  to  have  been  quite  shocked  for  even  glancing 
at  Holy  Writ  upon  such  an  occasion.  There  would 
have  been  an  appearance  of  good  sense  in  Miss 
Hawkins  had  she  adopted  the  ingenuous  manner  in 
which  Mr.  Gifford,  in  his  account  of  himself,  speaks 
of  his  own  origin  prefixed  to  his  translation  of 
Juvenal,  since  he  there  tells  us  that  he  was 
apprenticed  to  a  shoemaker.  Again,  too,  she  would 
also  have  done  well  had  she  recollected  that  Dr. 
Hutton  had  been  a  common  workman  in  a  coal- 
mine in  the  North  of  England  ;  and,  indeed,  there 
are  innumerable  instances  of  other  great  and  good 
men  who  have  arisen  from  the  most  humble  calling 
to  the  pinnacle  of  fame  and  honour.  That  highly - 
respected  character,  the  late  Mr.  Deputy  Nichols, 
one  of  the  editors  of  the  Gentleman  s  Magazine, 
informed  me  that  Cave,  the  original  Mr.  Urban, 
often  when  he  made  a  visit  desired  the  servant  to 
tell  his  master  that  '  The  cobbler's  son  had  called.' 
Samuel  Richardson,  the  author  of  '  Clarissa,'  had  no 
such  feelings  of  false  pride,  since  he  scrupled  not 
himself  to  say,  '  My  father's  business  was  that  of  a 
joiner.' 

As  Miss  Hawkins  did  not  think  proper  to  exempt 
me  from  Mr.  Sherwin's1  c  pupils  in  punch,'  and  as 
I  have  no  wish  to  leave  the  world  and  my  family 

1  John  Keyse  Sherwin,  the  engraver.     He  died  in  1790. — Ed. 


206  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

with  the  slander  of  drunkenness  attached  to  my 
memory,  when  at  no  period  of  my  life  have  I 
merited  that  stigma,  I  shall  endeavour  to  show  how 
little  this  lady,  who  is  so  fond  of  running  a  tilt  at 
others,  is  to  be  believed  in  some  of  her  assertions. 
At  page  32,  in  the  second  volume  of  her  Memoirs, 
she  states,  when  speaking  of  Sherwin's  eccentricities 
and  follies  (and  well  knowing  that  I  was  his  pupil 
at  that  time),  that  'he  fired  pistols  out  of  his 
window  half  the  night,  and  half  drowned  his  pupils  ; 
for,  sad  to  say,  he  had  pupils  in  punch.' 

Miss  Hawkins  states  on  the  same  page  that 
8  Sherwin  expired,  forlorn  and  comfortless,  in  a 
poor  apartment  of  a  public  inn  in  Oxford  Street  ;' 
whereas  the  fact  is  that  Sherwin  died  in  the  house 
of  the  late  Mr.  Kobert  Wilkinson,  the  print-seller, 
in  Cornhill,  who  kindly  attended  him,  afforded  him 
every  comfort,  and  paid  respect  to  his  remains  ; 
his  body  having  been  conveyed  to  Hampstead,  and 
buried  in  a  respectable  manner  in  the  churchyard, 
near  the  north-east  corner  of  the  front  entrance,  in 
the  very  grave  where  his  brother  George  had  been 
interred.  Miss  Hawkins  states  that  her  mother's 
portrait  was  painted  ;  by  Prince  Hoare  of  Bath ' ; 
she  should  have  said  William  Hoare,1  Esq.,  E.A., 
Prince  Hoare's  father.  Miss  Hawkins,  who  so 
often  considers  herself  obliged  to  her  brother  for  a 
good  thing,  allowed  the  following  to  be  printed  in 
page  218  of  the  first  volume  of  her  Memoirs. 

1  William  Hoare,  a  Suffolk  man,  born  in  1706,  became  a  fashionable 
portrait-painter  at  Bath,  where  he  died  in  1792.— Ed. 


THE  HA  WKINSES  207 


(H.  H.  loquitur.) 

Speaking  of  Dr.  Johnson,  H.  H.  says  :  *  Calling 
upon  him  shortly  after  the  death  of  Lord  Mansfield, 
and  mentioning  the  event,  he  answered,  "  Ah,  sir, 
there  was  little  learning  and  less  virtue  !" 

Now,  unfortunately  for  Miss  Hawkins  and  her 
brother  H.  H.,  this  fabricated  invective  can  never 
stand,  for  that  highly  respected  and  learned  judge, 
Lord  Mansfield,  died  on  Wednesday,  March  20, 
1794,  ten  years  after  the  death  of  Dr.  Johnson, 
with  whom  H.  H.  so  roundly  declares  he  conversed 
upon  his  lordship's  death.  As  Miss  Hawkins 
states  in  a  note  at  the  foot  of  page  227  of  the  first 
volume  of  her  Memoirs,  that  '  violation  of  truth 
cannot  be  treated  too  harshly,'  I  trust  that  I  shall 
stand  pardoned  for  what  I  am  doing,  especially  as 
in  the  first  volume,  page  150,  she  says,  'Brought 
up,  as  my  brothers  and  myself  were,  in  strict  regard 
to  truth,  and  in  abhorrence  of  all  insincerity,  even 
that  of  fashion.' 

I  think  in  charity  I  ought  to  plead  Miss  Hawkins' 
chronological  ignorance,  or  she  never  would  have 
acknowledged  that  she  applied  to  her  brother,  as 
she  does  in  page  258  of  the  first  volume  of  her 
Memoirs,  for  more  of  his  anecdotes  of  Lord  Mans- 
field and  Dr.  Johnson.  In  Dr.  Birch's  'Life  of 
Lord  Bacon,'  it  is  said  of  a  biographer  that  '  he  is 
fairly  to  record  the  faults  as  well  as  the  good 
qualities,  the  failings  as  well  as  the  perfections,  of 
the  dead  ;'  but  here  the  assertion  begins  with  the 
emphatic  word  fairly.     All  I  have  to  add  to  these 


208  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

remarks  is  that,  whether  Miss  Hawkins'  grand- 
father or  her  father  had  been  a  carpenter  or  not — 
since  she  has  asserted  her  descent  from  Sir  John 
Hawkins,  who  fought  against  the  Spanish  Armada 
— her  time  would  have  been  innocently  employed  if 
she  had  made  out  and  favoured  the  public  with  her 
own  pedigree,  and  proved  that  descent. 


[  2°9  ] 


CHAPTER  IX. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  favourite  amusements — Children's  headcloths  and  go- 
carts — Bethlehem  Hospital  and  Cibber's  figures — Anecdotes  of  Dr. 
Wolcot  and  Mr.  Nollekens,  Boswell,  H.  Tresham,  R.A.,  and  Fuseli 
— Eccentricities  of  Lord  Coleraine — Mr.  Nollekens  and  his  barber- 
Anecdotes  of  the  Rev.  John  Wesley — Mr.  Nollekens'  restoration  of 
antiques  at  Rome  —  Drawings  at  Rome  by  Mosman  —  Tailors — 
Family  quarrels  —  Mr.  Nollekens'  manoeuvres  for  importing  a 
picture  —  Coarseness  of  his  manners  —  Mr.  Charles  Townley  and 
the  Abbe  Devay — Portrait,  house,  and  antique  marbles  of  Mr. 
Townley  described — The  Royal  Cockpit — Immorality  of  Hogarth. 

During  my  long  intimacy  with  Mr.  Nollekens,  I 
never  once  heard  him  mention  the  name  of  the 
sweetest  bard  that  ever  sang,  from  whose  luxuriant 
garden  most  artists  have  gathered  their  choicest 
flowers.  To  the  beauties  of  the  immortal  Shake- 
speare he  was  absolutely  insensible,  nor  did  he  ever 
visit  the  theatre  when  his  plays  were  performed, 
though  he  was  actively  alive  to  a  pantomime,  and 
frequently  spake  of  the  capital  and  curious  tricks 
in  Harlequin  Sorcerer.  He  also  recollected  with 
pleasure  Mr.  Kich's  wonderful  and  singular  power 
of  scratching  his  ear  with  his  foot  like  a  dog  ;  and 
the  street-exhibition  of  Punch  and  his  wife  delighted 
him  beyond  expression.1 

1  He   would    probably    have    equally   enjoyed    the   sight   of   the 
Traveller  Twiss's  large  poodle  dog  walking  in  the  open  streets,  with 

14 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


In  this  gratification,  however,  our  sculptor  did 
not  stand  alone,  for  I  have  frequently  seen,  when  I 
have  stood  in  the  crowd,  wise  men  laugh  at  the 
mere  squeaking  of  Punch,  and  have  heard  them 
speak  of  his  cunning  pranks  with  the  highest 
ecstasy.  Indeed,  I  once  saw  two  brothers  of  the 
long  robe  involuntarily  stop  and  heartily  enjoy  the 
dialogue  of  that  merry  little  fellow  with  Jack  Ketch, 
who  was  about  to  hang  Punch  for  the  murder  of  his 
wife  and  his  innocent  babe.  These  brothers -in-law 
discovered,  however,  before  long  that  they  had  not 
only  lost  their  handkerchiefs  when  they  had  been 
elbowing  the  motley  group  for  the  best  places,  but 
that  they  had  deprived  a  baker,  to  whom  they 
had  too  closely  attached  themselves,  of  his  flowery 
influence. 

Nollekens,  when  noticing  nursery-maids  with 
little  children,  would  always  make  most  anxious 
inquiries  as  to  the  cutting  of  the  child's  teeth  ;  and 
so  addicted  was  he  to  accosting  strangers  in  the 
streets,  that  I  remember  once  his  stopping  to 
express  his  sense  of  the  kindness  of  a  mother  who 
had  made  a  pudding  for  her  child's  head,  by  saying, 
'  Ay,  now,  what's  your  name  ?'     c  Rap  worth,  sir.' 


an  immense  pair  of  spectacles  upon  his  nose,  cut  out  in  pasteboard, 
between  his  master  and  that  admirable  organist,  Samuel  Wesley, 
when  they  have  been  perambulating  Camden  Town  in  close  conversa- 
tion ;  and  have  beheld  the  scene  with  as  much  pleasure  as  those  who 
witnessed  the  attentive  gravity  of  the  traveller's  dog,  with  his  long 
shaggy  hair  hanging  over  his  head,  and  a  sagacity  of  look  as  if  he  was 
to  decide  the  not  unfrequently  knotty  points  upon  which  these 
celebrated  originals  frequently  conversed  during  their  pedestrian 
relaxations. — Smith. 


PUDDINGS  2ii 


'  Well,  Mrs.  Eapworth,  you  have  done  right ;  I 
wore  a  pudding  when  I  was  a  little  boy,  and  all 
my  mother's  children  wore  puddings.'1  As  to  the 
antiquity  of  this  cap,  which  is  now  seldom  seen, 
and  I  believe  totally  unknown  in  the  nurseries  of 
the  great,  I  can  safely  observe  that  the  child  of 
the  great  painter  Sir  Peter  Paul  Rubens  wore  one  ; 
as  those  mothers  who  are  fond  of  showing  their 
good  sense  by  taking  care  of  their  children  may 
see  in  that  truly  beautiful  mezzotinto  engraving  by 
McArdell,  of  Rubens,  his  wife  and  child  walking  in 
a  garden.2 

By  those  readers  who  are  fond  of  old  household 
furniture,  and  also  recollect  the  sensible  uses  of 
several  articles  of  that  denomination,  many  of 
which  are  now  nearly  thrown  aside,  the  following 
notice  of  the  go-cart  may  not  be  deemed  irrelevant 
to  the  subject  of  this  page.  It  was  unquestionably 
one  of  the  safest  and  most  useful  of  all  the  comforts 
of  the  nursery  and  the  infantile  playground  ;  and 
elderly  persons  will  recollect  that  it  was  so  con- 
structed that  it  safely  enclosed  and  supported  the 
child  in  an  upright  position,  a  little  below  its  arms, 
which  were  allowed  to  be  entirely  free  above  it. 
As  this  machine  moved  upon  castors,  the  child  was 

1  This  pudding  consisted  of  a  broad  black  silk  band,  padded  with 
wadding,  which  went  round  the  middle  of  the  head,  joined  to  two 
pieces  of  riband  crossing  on  the  top  of  the  head  and  then  tied  under 
the  chin,  so  that  by  this  most  excellent  contrivance  children's  heads 
were  often  preserved  uninjured  when  they  fell. — Smith. 

2  The  painting  from  which  this  engraving  was  made  is  now  at 
Blenheim. — Smith.  James  McArdell,  the  mezzotint  engraver  (1710- 
1765).— Ed. 


212  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

enabled  with  ease  to  go  forward,  whilst  in  conse- 
quence of  its  extending  so  widely  at  the  feet,  there 
was  no  danger  whatever  of  its  overturning  ;  and  I 
fully  expect,  as  most  things  come  round  again  in 
their  use,  that  the  affectionate  and  considerate 
mother  will  take  this  most  valuable  invention  again 
into  favour. 

The  go-cart  is  supposed  to  be  of  considerable 
antiquity,  since  a  figure  of  it  appears  upon  a  sarco- 
phagus of  a  child,  engraven  in  Montfaucon,1  and  it 
was  also  much  used  in  Germany  and  Holland  before 
it  was  known  in  England.  In  the  British  Museum, 
among  the  early  German  masters  of  the  fifteenth 
century,  there  is  a  rare  folio  sheet  woodcut,  repre- 
senting a  man  nearly  bent  double  by  age,  with  a 
long  flowing  beard,  placed  in  a  square  go-cart, 
supported  by  six  legs,  tastefully  and  curiously 
carved  with  foliage.  Upon  a  shelf  at  the  top  of 
the  go-cart,  which  projects  in  front  of  him,  is 
placed  an  hour-glass  surmounted  by  a  human 
skull  ;  but  these  he  does  not  appear  to  notice,  as 
his  eye  is  looking  straight  forward  and  considerably 
above  them.  He  is  seemingly  obeying  the  allure- 
ments of  a  boy  who  is  riding  on  a  stick,  with  a 
horse's  head  at  the  top.  On  one  side,  a  little  in 
advance  of  him  and  immediately  before  him,  is  a 
grave,  which,  if  we  may  judge  by  the  spade  which 
is  left  on  the  ground,  has  been  recently  dug  pur- 
posely for  his  reception.     Behind  him  is  another 

1  'Supplement  au  Livre  l'Antiquite  Expliquee,'  vol.  v.,  Paris, 
1724,  fol.,  book  v.,  ch.  i.,  sec.  ii.,  pp.  105,  106,  plates  xlii.,  xliii. — 
Smith. 


GO-CARTS  213 


child  pushing  on  the  go-cart,  seemingly  with  little 
exertion  ;  and  in  the  distance  there  is  a  buck, 
which  appears  to  be  bounding  back  again  after  he 
had  accompanied  this  aged  man  to  the  brink  of 
eternity,  into  which  the  infant  is  so  easily  pushing 
him.1 

In  Quarles's  c  Emblems '  there  is  also  a  go-cart 
introduced  ;  and  Eembrandt  has  etched  one,  where 
a  nurse  or  mother  is  inviting  the  child  who  is 
in  it  to  walk  to  her.  This  print  is  numbered  186  in 
Daulby's  '  Catalogue  of  Kembrandt's  Etchings,'  and 
is  there  called  '  The  Go-cart.'  When  I  was  a  boy 
the  go-cart  was  common  in  every  toy-shop  in 
London  ;  but  it  was  to  be  found  in  the  greatest 
abundance  in  the  once  far-famed  turner's  shops  in 
Spinning-wheel  Alley,  Moorfields,  a  narrow  passage 
leading  from  those  fields  to  the  spot  upon  which  the 
original  Bethlehem  Hospital  stood  in  Bishopsgate 
Street,  and  upon  which  site  numerous  houses  were 
erected,  and  formerly  called  Old  Bethlehem.  In 
1825-26,  however,  both  Spinning-wheel  Alley 
and  Old  Bethlehem  were  considerably  altered  and 
widened,  and  subsequently  named  Liverpool  Street. 

Upon  the  establishment  of  the  late  Bethlehem 
Hospital,  and,  indeed,  down  to  the  time  of  King 
Charles  II.,  the  men  and  women  were  crowded 
together  in  one  ward.     I  have  seen,  by  favour  of 

1  A  design,  almost  similar,  has  been  attributed  to  Michael  Angelo, 
of  which  there  are  two  different  prints,  one  being  without  any 
etigraver's  name  or  year  of  publication,  though  the  other  is  dated 
1538,  and  was  published  by  Antonio  Salamanca.  Mr.  Duppa,  in  his 
'Life  of  Michael  Angelo  Buonarroti,'  London,  1806,  has  given  an  out- 
line copy  of  this  subject. — Smith. 


214  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Dr.  Haslam,  several  of  the  early  manuscript 
account-books  of  this  hospital,  in  one  of  which 
there  was  the  following  entry :  '  This  clay  the 
neighbouring  flax-dressers  were  called  in,  who  gave 
the  unruly  patients  a  good  dressing.'  Whenever 
Nollekens  heard  the  figures  of  Raving  and  Melan- 
choly madness  mentioned,  which  were  carved  by 
Gabriel  Cibber1  for  the  piers  of  the  gates  of  Bethle- 
hem Hospital,  built  in  Moorfields,  he  never  ex- 
pressed himself  pleased  with  them.  This  was  not 
the  case  with  Roubiliac,  the  sculptor,  who  never 
left  the  city,  when  he  went  there  to  receive  money, 
without  going  round,  sometimes  considerably  out  of 
his  way,  to  admire  them. 

It  is  said  that  Cibber  carved  these  figures,  which 
.are  now  preserved  in  the  hall  of  the  new  hospital 
in  St.  George's  Fields,  at  once  from  the  block, 
without  any  previous  drawing  or  model  whatever. 
An  instance  of  similar  talent  for  extemporary  pro- 
ductions I  have  heard  mentioned  by  Mr.  Joseph 
Cauldfield,  a  music-engraver,  and  a  most  excellent 
teacher  of  the  pianoforte,  who  has  declared  that 
the  celebrated  Charles  Dibdin  assured  him  that  he 
had  frequently  composed  a  song,  with  all  its  musical 
accompaniments,  and  played  it  in  public  on  the 
evening  of  the  same  day  entirely  by  memory,  with- 
out the  slightest  written  memoranda. 

Those  who  recollect  the  figure  of  Dr.  Wolcot  in 
his  robust,  upright  state,  and  the  diminutive  appear  - 

1  Caius  Gabriel  Cibber,  a  Danish  sculptor,  settled  in  England.  He 
was  Carver  to  the  Closet  to  William  III.,  and  the  father  of  Colley 
Cibber,  the  playwright.     He  died  in  1700.— Ed. 


PETER  PINDAR  215 


ance  of  Mr.  Nollekens,  can  readily  picture  to  them- 
selves their  extreme  contrast,  when  the  former 
accosted  the  latter  one  evening  at  his  gate  in 
Titchfield  Street  nearly  in  the  following  manner  : 
4  Why,  Nollekens,  you  never  speak  to  me  now. 
Pray,  what  is  the  reason  ?'  Nollekens :  '  Why,  you 
have  published  such  lies  of  the  King,  and  had  the 
impudence  to  send  them  to  me  ;  but  Mrs.  Nollekens 
burnt  them,  and  I  desire  you'll  send  no  more.  The 
Royal  Family  are  very  good  to  me,  and  are  great 
friends  to  all  the  artists,  and  I  don't  like  to  hear 
anybody  say  anything  against  them.'  Upon  which 
the  Doctor  put  his  cane  upon  the  sculptor's 
shoulder,  and  exclaimed :  '  Well  said,  little  Nolly  ! 
I  like  the  man  who  sticks  to  his  friend.  You  shall 
make  a  bust  of  me  for  that.'  c  I'll  see  you  d — d 
first !'  answered  Nollekens  ;  '  and  I  can  tell  you  this 
besides — no  man  in  the  Royal  Academy  but  Opie 
would  have  painted  your  picture  ;  and  you  richly 
deserved  the  broken  head  you  got  from  Grifford  in 
Wright's  shop.  Mr.  Cook,  of  Bedford  Square, 
showed  me  his  handkerchief  dipped  in  your  blood  ; 
and  so  now  you  know  my  mind.  Come  in,  my 
Cerberus,  come  in.'  His  dog  then  followed  him  in, 
and  he  left  the  Doctor  at  the  gate,  which  he  barred 
up  for  the  night. 

Nollekens,  who  always  expressed  the  highest 
pleasure  when  seeing  French  and  Italian  women 
dance,  congratulated  himself  upon  the  burning 
down  of  the  opera-house  in  the  Haymarket  by 
observing :  '  Now  the  managers  have  hired  the 
Pantheon  in  Oxford  Street,  I  shall  not  have  so  far 


216  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

to  go  in  the  rain !'  When  he  first  was  a  frequenter 
of  the  opera,  which  he  never  missed  when  c  bones ' 
of  admission  were  sent  to  him,  gentlemen  were 
obliged  to  go  in  swords  and  bags  in  full-dress, 
which  custom,  however,  was  dropped  on  the 
removal  to  the  Pantheon  ;  so  that  Nollekens  was 
more  at  home,  as  he  was  now  and  then  seen  to  take 
out  a  worsted  stocking  and  tie  it  round  his  neck 
whenever  he  had  a  sore  throat,  to  which  he  was 
often  subject. 

James  Boswell,  the  faithful  biographer  of  Dr. 
Johnson,  meeting  him  in  the  pit  of  the  Pantheon, 
loudly  exclaimed  :  '  Why,  Nollekens,  how  dirty  you 
go  now!  I  recollect  when  you  were  the  gayest 
dressed  of  any  in  the  house.'  To  whom  Nollekens 
made,  for  once  in  his  life,  the  retort  courteous  of, 
c  That's  more  than  I  could  ever  say  of  you.' 
Boswell  certainly  looked  very  badly  when  dressed, 
for,  as  he  seldom  washed  himself,  his  clean  ruffles 
served  as  a  striking  contrast  to  his  dirty  flesh. 

Tresham,1  the  Koyal  Academician,  who  had  been 
employed  to  decorate  the  front  of  the  stage  at  the 
Pantheon,  filled  the  tympanum  with  a  profusion  of 
figures  displaying  the  sciences,  of  which  perform- 
ance he  was  not  a  little  proud.  Having  taken  his 
seat  in  the  front  to  see  the  effect  of  his  pencil,  on 
looking  behind  him  he  found  his  nearest  companion 
was  Puseli,  to  whom  he  addressed  himself  with  : 
•  Well,  Mr.  Fuseli,  how  do  you  like  my  pedimental 

1  Henry  Tresham  (1749  V-1814),  an  Irish  historical  painter,  was 
elected  A.R.A.  in  1791,  and  R.A.  in  1799.  He  was  professor  of 
painting  from  1807  to  1809.— Ed. 


ECCENTRICS  217 

colouring  ?'  to  which  he  received  no  answer  ;  but  at 
last,  after  putting  several  other  questions  with  as 
little  success,  he  roused  him  by  the  interrogative 
of  :  '  How  do  you  like  the  drawing  of  my  figures  ?' 
To  which  Fuseli,  who  heard  the  bell  ring,  observed  : 
'  The  drawing  bespeaks  something  clever — I  mean 
the  drawing  of  the  curtain,'  which  the  mechanists 
were  just  at  that  moment  engaged  in  raising. 
Fuseli,  however,  soon  alleviated  the  embarrassment 
of  his  brother  R.A.  by  remarking  that  the  conceited 
scene-painter,  Mr.  Capon,1  to  whom  Sheridan  had 
given  the  nickname  of  '  Pompous  Billy,'  had  '  piled 
up  his  lump  of  rocks  as  regularly  on  the  side- 
scenes  as  a  baker  would  his  quartern  loaves  upon 
the  shelves  behind  his  counter  to  cool.' 

I  believe  every  age  produces  at  least  one  eccentric 
in  every  city,  town,  and  village.  Be  this  as  it  may, 
go  where  you  wTill,  you  will  find  some  half-witted 
fellow  under  the  nickname  either  of  Dolly,  Silly 
Billy,  or  Foolish  Sam,  who  is  generally  the  butt 
and  sport  of  his  neighbours,  and  from  whom, 
simple  as  he  may  sometimes  be,  a  sensible  answer 
is  expected  to  an  unthinking  question :  like  the 
common  children,  who  will,  to  our  annoyance, 
inquire  of  our  neighbour's  parrot  what  it  is  o'clock. 
In  some  such  light  Nollekens  was  often  held  even 
by  his  brother  artists  ;  and  I  once  heard  Fuseli  cry 
out,  when  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street : 
c  Nollekens,  Nollekens !  why  do  you  walk  in  the 
sun  ?  If  you  have  no  love  for  your  few  brains, 
you  should  not  melt  your  coat-buttons.' 

1  William  Capon  of  Norwich  (1757-1827).— Ed. 


218  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

The  eccentric  character  is,  however,  sure  to  be 
found  in  London,  where  there  are  several  curious 
varieties  of  this  class  of  persons  to  be  met  with. 
In  our  walks,  perchance,  we  may  meet  a  man  who 
always  casts  his  eyes  towards  the  ground,  as  if  he 
were  ashamed  of  looking  anyone  in  the  face,  and 
who  pretends  when  accosted  to  be  near-sighted,  so 
that  he  does  not  know  even  the  friend  that  had 
served  him.  Indeed,  he  draws  his  hat  across  his 
forehead  to  act  as  an  eyeshade,  so  that  his  sallow 
visage  cannot  immediately  be  recognised,  which 
makes  him  look  as  if  he  had  done  something 
wrong,  whilst  his  coat  is  according  to  the  true 
Addison  cut,  wTith  square  pockets,  large  enough  to 
carry  the  folio  4  Ship  of  Fools.5  Nollekens,  though 
simple,  was  entirely  free  from  any  artful  singularity 
of  this  kind,  and  he  walked  as  if  he  meant  to  give 
everyone  he  met  the  good-morrow  ;  and  if  he  had 
a  fault  in  his  latter  perambulations,  it  wTas  that  of 
exposing  himself  to  the  cunningly  inclined. 

No  man  was  more  gazed  at  than  the  late  Lord 
Coleraine.1  That  eccentric  and  remarkable  char- 
acter, who  lived  near  the  New  Queen's  Head  and 
Artichoke,  in  Marylebone  Fields,  never  met 
Nollekens  without  saluting  him  with,  '  Well,  Nolly, 
my  old  boy,  how  goes  it  ?  You  never  sent  me  the 
bust  of  the  Prince.'  To  which  Nollekens  replied, 
4  You  know  you  said  you  would  call  for  it  one  of 

1  Colonel  George  Hanger.  He  became  fourth  Baron  Coleraine  in 
1810,  but  refused  to  take  the  title.  His  eccentric  manners  were  too 
coarse  even  for  the  Prince  Kegent.  He  had  spent  many  years  in 
America,  and  in  1801  he  made  a  curiously  accurate  prophecy  of  the 
Civil  War  in  the  United  States.     He  died  in  1824.— Ed. 


LORD  COLE  R  A  IN E  219 

these  days,  and  give  me  the  money,  and  take  it 
away  in  a  hackney-coach.'  I  remember  seeing  his 
lordship  after  he  had  purchased  a  book,  entitled 
'  The  American  Buccaneers,'  sit  down  close  by  the 
shop  from  which  he  had  bought  it,  in  the  open 
street  in  St.  Giles's,  to  read  it.  I  also  once  heard 
Lord  Coleraine,  as  I  was  passing  the  wall  at  the 
end  of  Portland  Eoad,  when  an  old  apple-woman, 
with  whom  his  lordship  held  frequent  conversations, 
was  packing  up  her  fruit,  ask  her  the  following 
question  :  '  What  are  you  about,  mother  ?'  c  Why, 
my  lord,  I  am  going  home  to  my  tea.  If  your 
lordship  wants  any  information,  I  shall  come  again 
presently.'  '  Oh,  don't  balk  trade !  Leave  your 
things  on  the  table  as  they  are  ;  I  will  mind  shop 
till  you  come  back  ;'  so  saying,  he  seated  himself  in 
the  old  woman's  wooden  chair,  in  which  he  had 
often  sat  before  whilst  chatting  Avith  her.  Being 
determined  to  witness  the  result,  after  strolling 
about  till  the  return  of  the  old  lady,  I  heard  his 
lordship  declare  the  amount  of  his  receipts  by 
saying :  '  Well,  mother,  I  have  taken  threepence 
halfpenny  for  you.  Did  your  daughter  Nancy 
drink  tea  with  you  ?' 

Mr.  Nollekens,  on  entering  his  barber's  shop,  was 
always  glad  to  find  another  shavee  under  the  suds, 
as  it  afforded  him  an  opportunity  of  looking  at  his 
favourite  paper,  the  Daily  Advertiser.  When  his 
turn  arrived,  and  he  was  seated  for  the  operation, 
he  placed  one  of  Mrs.  Nollekens'  curling-papers, 
which  he  had  untwisted  for  the  purpose,  upon  his 
right  shoulder,  upon  which  the  barber  wiped  his 


220  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

razor.  Nollekens  cried  out,  c  Shave  close,  Hancock, 
for  I  was  obliged  to  come  twice  last  week,  you 
used  so  blunt  a  razor.'  l  Lord,  sir,'  answered  the 
poor  barber,  '  you  don't  care  how  I  wear  my  razors 
out  by  sharpening  them.'  Mr.  Nollekens,  who  had 
been  under  his  hand  for  upwards  of  twenty  years, 
was  so  correct  an  observer  of  its  application  that 
he  generally  pronounced  at  the  last  flourish,  '  That 
will  do  ;'  and  before  the  shaver  could  take  off  the 
cloth,  he  dexterously  drew  down  the  paper,  folded 
it  up,  and  carried  it  home  in  his  hand,  for  the 
purpose  of  using  it  the  next  morning  when  he 
washed  himself. 

The  following  is  a  verse  of  a  droll  song  which 
Xollekens  used  to  sing  when  I  was  a  boy,  and  with 
which  he  was  always  highly  delighted. 

'  So  a  rat  by  degrees 
Fed  a  kitten  with  cheese, 

Till  kitten  grew  up  to  a  cat ; 
When  the  cheese  was  all  spent, 
Nature  follow'd  its  bent, 

And  puss  quickly  ate  up  the  rat.' 

He  observed  that  his  mother,  who  was  fond  of 
curious  sights,  once  took  him  to  see  c  Adams' 
Rarities '  at  the  sign  of  the  Royal  Swan,  in 
Kingsland  Road,  where  he  saw  a  pillory  for  a  rat. 

Nollekens'  manners  and  sentiments  were  such,  if 
we  may  with  the  least  degree  of  propriety  be 
permitted  to  denominate  his  deportment  mannerly, 
that  though  he  would  often  hold  long,  and  some- 
times entertaining,  conversations  with  the  com- 
monest  people  with   the   utmost   good-nature,    he 


JOHN  WESLEY  221 


would  never  suffer  himself  to  be  persuaded  to 
model  a  bust  of  any  of  the  sectarians  in  religion. 
The  dignified  clergy,  and  all  persons  holding  high 
offices  in  the  affairs  of  Government,  were  the 
characters  he  delighted  to  model.  I  recollect  that 
several  of  the  friends  of  John  Wesley  often  applied 
to  him  for  a  portrait  of  their  pastor  ;  but  he  never 
would  listen  to  their  importunities,  though  they 
repeatedly  declared  to  him  that  he  was  one  of  the 
worthiest  members  of  any  society  existing.  I  have 
been  assured  that  Wesley  never  wished  to  make 
money  by  preaching,  unless  it  were  to  enable  him 
to  extend  his  acts  of  charity  to  the  poor,  in  proof 
of  which  I  beg  leave  to  repeat  the  following 
anecdote  nearly,  I  believe,  as  I  heard  it  from  his 
nephew,  Mr.  Samuel  Wesley. 

An  order  was  made  in  the  House  of  Lords  in 
May,  1776,  for  the  Commissioners  of  his  Majesty's 
Excise  to  write  circular  letters  to  all  persons  who 
they  had  reason  to  suspect  had  plate,  and  also  to 
those  who  had  not  regularly  paid  the  duty  on  the 
same.  In  consequence  of  this  order,  the  Accountant- 
general  for  Household  Plate  sent  to  the  Rev. 
John  Wesley  a  copy  of  it,  and  the  following  was 
the  answer  returned  to  him  : 

4  Sir, 

'  I  have  two  silver  teaspoons  in  London,  and  two  at  Bristol. 
This  is  all  the  plate  which  I  have  at  present  ;  and  I  shall  not  buy  any 
more  while  so  many  around  me  want  bread.     I  am,  sir, 

1  Your  humble  servant, 

'John  Wesley.' 

When  the  death  of  Deare,  the  sculptor,  was 
communicated   to  Nollekens,    he   observed  :  '  He's 


222  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

dead,  is  he  ?  That  palavering  fellow,  Fagan,1 
promised  me  some  of  his  drawings,  but  I  never  had 
any.  I  have  got  two  of  his  four  basso-relievos  of 
the  Seasons,  and  the  two  oval  basso-relievos  of 
Cupid  and  Psyche.  They  are  very  clever,  I  assure 
you  ;  but  he  was  a  very  upstart  fellow,  or  he  ought 
to  have  made  money  by  sending  over  some  antiques 
from  Rome.  I  told  him  I'd  sell  'em  for  him,  and 
so  might  many  of  'em  ;  but  the  sculptors  nowadays 
never  care  for  bringing  home  anything.  They're 
all  so  stupid  and  conceited  of  their  own  abilities. 
Why,  do  you  know,  I  got  all  the  first,  and  the 
best  of  my  money,  by  putting  antiques  together  ? 
Hamilton,  and  I,  and  Jenkins  generally  used  to  go 
shares  in  what  we  bought  ;  and  as  I  had  to  match 
the  pieces  as  well  as  I  could,  and  clean  'em,  I  had 
the  best  part  of  the  profits.  Gavin  Hamilton  was 
a  good  fellow  ;  but  as  for  Jenkins,  he  followed  the 
trade  of  supplying  the  foreign  visitors  with  intaglios 
and  cameos  made  by  his  own  people,  that  he  kept 
in  a  part  of  the  ruins  of  the  Colosseum,  fitted  up  for 
'em  to  work  in  slyly  by  themselves.  I  saw  'em  at 
work,  though  ;  and  Jenkins  gave  a  whole  handful 
of  'em  to  me  to  say  nothing  about  the  matter  to 
anybody  else  but  myself.  Bless  your  heart!  he 
sold  'em  as  fast  as  they  made  'em.  Jenkins  had  a 
great  many  pictures  by  many  of  the  Old  Masters. 
Mosman,  the  German,  made  drawings  of  'em  in 
black  chalk  for  Lord  Exeter,  who  was  his  en- 
courager  for  many  years.' 

The  cause  of  Mosman  being  thus  employed  was 

1  Robert  Fagan,  an  art-dealer,  who  was  in  Rome  for  the  purpose  of 
collecting  old  pictures  from  1794  to  1798. — Ed. 


MOSMAN  AND  LORD  EXETER  223 

related  by  his  patron,  the  late  Earl  of  Exeter, 
nearly  to  the  following  effect :  His  lordship,  when 
at  Rome,  having  entered  a  church,  was  surprised 
by  seeing  a  common  soldier  making  a  most  elaborate 
drawing  from  one  of  the  altar-pieces.  He  com- 
plimented him  upon  his  talent,  and  at  the  same 
time  expressed  his  astonishment  in  seeing  a  man  of 
his  extraordinary  powers  in  the  dress  of  a  common 
soldier.  '  Sir,'  said  the  draughtsman,  '  you  are 
welcome  to  look  at  my  drawing  ;  but  you  have  no 
right  to  remind  me  of  my  condition.'  Lord  Exeter, 
whose  dress  did  not  upon  every  occasion  bespeak 
his  rank,  assured  him  of  his  power  to  serve  him  if 
he  stood  in  need  of  a  friend  ;  and  when  Mosman 
found  by  whom  he  had  been  questioned,  he  stated 
in  a  few  words  that  for  eighteen  years  he  had  been 
tormented  by  a  vixen  of  a  wife,  till  at  last  he  left 
her  in  full  possession  of  all  his  household  property, 
pictures,  drawings,  etc.,  and  enlisted  into  a  foreign 
regiment  as  a  common  man — that  his  officer,  who 
had  heard  his  story,  was  very  kind  to  him,  and  gave 
him  leave  to  make  the  drawing  he  was  then  engaged 
upon.  Lord  Exeter  purchased  his  discharge,  and 
employed  him  to  make  drawings  of  various  fine 
pictures,  of  which  at  that  time  there  were  no 
engravings.  These  drawings  now  fill  four  im- 
mensely large  volumes,  and  were  given  by  his 
lordship  to  the  British  Museum  ;  and  at  the  com- 
mencement of  the  first  of  these  splendid  books  is 
the  following  note  : 

'  Mr.  Nollekens,  Statuary,  in  Mortimer-street,  London,  assured  me 
that  he  was  at  Rome  when  the  drawings  in  this  book  were  made  by 


224  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

one  Mosman,  a  German,1  who  was  recommended  to  Brownlow,  Earl 
of  Exeter  ;  and  he  worked  at  them  several  years  at  five  shillings 
a-day.  Afterwards  Lord  Exeter  gave  him  half-a-guinea.  Lord  Exeter 
told  Mr.  Nollekens  the  book  cost  him  2,000/.  Mosman  was  a  pupil 
of  Mengs. 

(Fras.  Annesley.' 

One  day,  what  some  persons  would  call  '  an  old- 
fashioned  boy '  brought  Mr.  Nollekens  home  a  pair 
of  inexpressibles,  that  his  master,  a  botching  tailor, 
who  worked  in  an  opposite  stall,  had  seated  for 
him.  Nollekens,  after  paying  him  the  eighteen- 
pence,  which  was  the  sum  agreed  upon  for  the 
job,  asked  the  boy  how  old  he  was.  '  Sixteen,' 
answered  he.  '  Why,  you're  rather  short  of  your 
age,'  rejoined  the  sculptor  ;  upon  which  the  boy 
put  the  same  question  to  the  master  of  the  small- 
clothes, who  having  answered,  'Near  sixty' — 'Why, 
you're  very  short  for  your  age,  I  am  sure!'  retorted 
the  son  of  Accutus.2 

I  shall  now  give  my  reader  a  sketch  of  one  of  the 
family  disputes  in  which  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nollekens 
sometimes  freely  indulged. 

One  day  Bronze  heard  a  more  violent  disputation 

1  It  appears  on  the  manuscript  title-page  of  the  first  volume  of  these 
drawings  that  Joseph  was  considered  as  Mosman's  Christian  name  ; 
but  in  numerous,  and  indeed  all,  instances  where  the  artist  has  written 
his  own  name  upon  the  drawings,  he  signs  Nicholas  Mosman.  The 
same  title-page  states  that  he  was  a  native  of  Rous,  in  Lorraine,  and 
died  August  14,  1787,  aged  fifty-eight  years  two  months  and  eleven 
days. — Smith. 

2  The  great  warrior,  John  Accutus,  was  originally  a  tailor.  Those 
invaluable  historians  of  everlasting  reference,  John  Stow  and  John 
Speed,  were  also  tailors ;  and  I  could  introduce  the  names  of  many 
other  worthy  men  now  living,  of  the  highest  talents,  who  have 
exchanged  the  needle,  thimble,  scissors,  and  shopboard  for  poetry  and 
painting. — Smith. 


FAMILY  SQUABBLES  225 

than  usual  between  her  master  and  mistress  : 
4  What  !'  cried  he,  '  what !  madam,  you're  at  your 
old  tricks  again  ?  Twopence  indeed  !  I  say  I  paid 
you  the  twopence  for  the  letter,  and  I'll  take  my 
'davy  of  it !'  '  Very  well,  sir,  very  well ;  it's 
mighty  well,  perfectly  correct,  and  perfectly  just, 
Mr.  Positive,  I  dare  say,'  retorted  Mrs.  Nollekens  ; 
4  you  shall  see,  sir,  from  this  very  moment  I  will 
never  pay  for  a  letter  of  yours  again  !'  Then,  after 
a  pause,  her  bit  of  slate  was  thrown  on  the  floor, 
and  the  lady  in  a  whining  tone,  which  convinced 
Bronze  she  was  wound  up  to  the  highest  pitch, 
cried  with  a  half-stifled  sob,  '  You  know — you 
know — you  vile  little  thing  !•  you  paid  me  only 
two  shillings  and  sevenpence  on  last  Thursday's 
account.'  1 1  tell  you  this,  and  now  mind  what  I 
say,'  replied  Nollekens,  '  that  if  it  was  so,  it's  your 
own  fault,  for  I  never  will  pay  a  farthing  more 
when  you  have  once  smeared  the  slate,  that  I  tell 
you.'  A  knock  at  the  door  induced  Bronze  to  go 
in,  and  say,  l  Hush  !  hush  !  there's  a  knock  at  the 
street-door.'  '  I  don't  care,'  exclaimed  the  sculptor, 
c  she  shan't  colly-wabble  me.  Go  and  see  who  it 
is.'  '  Want  any  fish  to-day  ?'  asked  an  Irish  fish- 
woman  ;  *  it's  Friday,  bless  ye  !'  'I  don't  care  for 
Friday.1     I've  had  dinner  enough,  quite   enough,' 

1  Whatever  a  man's  religion  may  be,  some  praise  is  due  to  him  for 
his  attention  to  the  tenets  of  that  faith.  I  fear  Nollekens  was  not 
entitled  to  much  credit  for  observances  to  what  he  called  his  Mother 
Church,  for  I  have  often  heard  him  declare  that  the  patronage  of  his 
friend  Cardinal  Albani,  a  great  lover  of  sculpture,  secured  him  from 
the  observations  of  many  persons,  as  to  his  neglect  of  religious  duties. 
— Smith. 

15 


226  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

answered  JNollekens,  who  walked  out  of  the  room 
with  only  one  slipper  on.  'Betty  !  Betty  !  shut 
the  door  ;  it  is  very  odd  that  people  will  not  take 
an  answer,'  rejoined  Mrs.  Nollekens. 

At  three  o'clock,  however,  some  chops  were  pro- 
duced, and  the  half- sullen  pair  began  both  to  be 
sorry  for  their  little  heat ;  but  after  the  table-cloth 
was  removed,  upon  Bronze  going  into  the  parlour 
with  coals,  she  found  them  so  perfectly  recon- 
ciled that  her  master  was  patting  her  mistress's 
cheek  with  the  backs  of  his  fingers,  and  they  both 
appeared 

'  Still  amorous,  and  fond,  and  billing, 
Like  Philip  ajod  Mary  on  a  shilling.' 

Or, 

'  Like  dogs  that  snarl  about  a  bone, 
l  And  play  together  when  they've  none.' 

Nollekens,  though  his  cunning  wTas  truly  amusing, 
particularly  whenever  he  could  gain  the  whip-hand 
of  his  w^ife,  yet  at  times,  like  Sir  Giles  Overreach, 
over-reached  himself;  and  this  he  did  most  com- 
pletely when  he  returned  from  Rome,  as  will 
appear  from  the  following  anecdote,  which  was 
communicated  to  me  by  one  of  his  relations. 

When  he  was  preparing  to  leave  Italy  for 
England,  he  wished  to  bring,  among  a  quantity  of 
other  things,  a  large  picture,  but  after  reflecting 
upon  the  immense  duty  that  might  be  put  upon  it 
on  account  of  its  enormous  size,  he  very  ingeniously 
hit  upon  the  sensible  expedient  of  cutting  it  into 
several  pieces,  cunningly  concluding  that  the  in- 
spector at  the  Custom-house  would  pass  them  over 


CHARLES  TOWNLEY  227 

as  useless  mutilations.  But  lo  !  when  these  cut- 
tings were  inspected,  the  officer,  in  placing  them 
together,  detected  his  countryman's  intended  de- 
ception, and  by  making  it  known  to  the  Com- 
missioners, he  was  made  to  pay  for  every  portion  as 
a  distinct  picture. 

Nollekens  knew  so  little  of  what  is  generally 
denominated  good-breeding,  that  when  he  has  been 
at  the  country-house  of  any  of  his  employers 
putting  up  a  monument,  his  conversation  has  been 
often  so  unguarded  and  vulgar  as  to  occasion  a 
table  to  be  ordered  for  him  in  a  room  by  himself, 
which  deprived  him  of  the  agreeable  society  he 
might  otherwise  have  been-  entitled  to.  I  know 
this  to  have  been  the  case  when  he  was  at  the  seat 
of  a  certain  nobleman,  of  which  he  complained  to 
Mrs.  Nollekens  on  his  return  to  town. 

Mr.  Charles  Townley,  however,  did  not  follow 
this  plan,  for  that  gentleman,  who  had  noticed 
Nollekens  at  Rome,  kindly  continued  for  years  to 
entertain  him  at  his  house,  No.  7,  in  Park  Street, 
Westminster  ;  and  whenever  any  person  spake  of 
good  eating,  Mr.  Nollekens  always  gave  his  friend 
Mr.  Townley  the  highest  credit  for  keeping  a  most 
excellent  table.  CI  am  sure,'  said  he,  'to  make  a 
good  dinner  at  his  house  on  a  Sunday  ;  but  there  is 
a  little  man,  a  great  deal  less  than  myself,  who 
dines  there,  of  the  name  of  Devay,  a  French  abbe, 
who  beats  me  out  and  out ;  he  is  one  of  the  greatest 
gormandizers  I  ever  met  with,  though,  to  look  at 
him,  you  would  declare  him  to  be  in  the  most 
deplorable  state  of  starvation.' 


228  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

The  Abbe  Devav  was  an  excellent  man  :  lie  con- 
versed  and  wrote  in  many  languages,  and  his  reading 
and  memory  were  so  extensive  and  useful  that 
Mr.  Townley,  who  referred  to  him  in  his  literary 
concerns,  always  called  him  his  '  walking  library.' 
The  high  qualifications  of  the  Abbe  were  also 
known  and  acknowledged  by  other  men  of  learn- 
ing ;  he  was  frequently  present  at  the  breakfast- 
table  and  conversazioni  of  Sir  Joseph  Banks,  and 
instructed  several  persons  of  eminence  in  the 
classics. 

The  Sunday  dinners  of  Mr.  Townley,  mentioned 
above,  were  principally  for  professors  of  the  arts, 
and  Sir  Joshua  Eeynolds  and  Zoffany  generally 
enlivened  the  circle.  The  last-mentioned  of  these 
celebrated  characters  painted  a  picture  called  '  Mr. 
Townley's  Gallery  of  Statues';  it  was  a  portrait  of 
the  library,  though  not  strictly  correct  as  to  its 
contents,  since  all  the  best  of  the  marbles  displayed 
in  various  parts  of  the  house  were  brought  into  the 
painting  by  the  artist,  who  made  it  up  into  a 
picturesque  composition  according  to  his  own  taste. 
The  likeness  of  Mr.  Townley  is  extremely  good. 
He  is  seated,  and  looks  like  the  dignified  possessor 
of  such  treasures  ;  at  his  feet  lies  his  favourite 
dog  Kam,  a  native  of  Kamschatka,  whose  mother 
was  one  of  the  dogs  yoked  to  a  sledge  which  drew 
Captain  King  in  that  island.  Opposite  to  Mr. 
Townley  is  Monsieur  D'Hancarville,  seated  at  a 
table  with  a  book  open  before  him,  behind  whose 
chair  stand  two  others  of  his  friends,  Thomas 
Astle,   Esq.,   and   the  Hon.  'Charles  G- revile,  con- 


CHARLES  TOWN  LEY  229 

versing.  There  is  a  large  engraving  of  this  picture, 
but  unfortunately  it  is  in  an  unfinished  state.  The 
painting  itself  has  lately  been  sent  to  Townley 
Hall.  This  picture  is  of  the  same  description,  in 
point  of  subject  and  colouring,  as  the  one  painted 
by  the  same  artist  of  the  Florentine  Gallery  for  the 
late  King  George  III. 

That  excellent  monarch,  having  heard  this  collec- 
tion of  marbles  much  spoken  of,  so  highly  respected 
Mr.  Townley  that  his  Majesty  declared  his  intention 
of  visiting  him,  though  he  never  did.  It  happened, 
however,  that  when  Mr.  Townley  petitioned  the 
Board  of  Works  to  allow  a  tree  in  the  Birdcage 
Walk  which  darkened  his  house  to  be  cut  down,  the 
King,  to  whom  this  petition  was  submitted,  at  once 
most  liberally  gave  permission,  observing  that  Mr. 
Townley  should  have  every  possible  accommodation. 
It  is  very  remarkable  that  this  gentleman  was  not 
only  obliged  by  the  King,  but  afterwards  by  an 
easterly  wind,  which,  according  to  the  proverb, 
seldom  proves  beneficial,  for  no  sooner  was  the  tree 
cut  down  than  a  tremendous  hurricane  arose,  which 
tore  up  the  one  that  had  stood  next  to  it,  by  which 
his  rooms  received  an  extensive  and  uninterrupted 
light  from  the  north. 

From  what  I  have  seen  and  heard  described,  in 
no  instance  can  a  orivate  residence  be  found  to 
equal  that  of  the  late  Charles  Townley,  Esq.  The 
possession  of  taste  and  an  affluent  fortune  qualified 
and  enabled  that  enlightened  and  elegant  gentleman 
to  indulge,  in  the  course  of  his  travels,  in  the 
purchase  of  those   antiques  which  now  grace  the 


230  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Townley  Gallery  of  the  British  Museum,  which 
will  clo  eternal  honour  to  his  memory,  as  well  as  to 
the  Government  which  so  liberally  purchased  them. 
These  treasures  still  keep  their  estimation  with  the 
public,  notwithstanding  the  Elgin  marbles  are  now 
considered  by  the  professors,  in  every  branch  of 
the  polite  arts,  to  comprise  the  artists'  primer.  I 
shall  now  endeavour  to  anticipate  the  wish  of  the 
reader  by  giving  a  brief  description  of  those  rooms 
of  Mr.  Townley's  house,  in  which  that  gentleman's 
liberality  employed  me  when  a  boy,  with  many 
other  students  in  the  Royal  Academy,  to  make 
drawings  for  his  portfolios. 

As  the  visitor  entered  the  hall,  his  attention  was 
arrested  by  an  immense  sarcophagus  on  his  left 
hand,  measuring  seven  feet  in  length,  opposite  to 
which  were  two  heads  of  lions,  the  size  of  life,  one 
on  either  side  of  the  chimney-piece.  This  hall  was 
also  adorned  with  bas-reliefs,  sepulchral  monu- 
ments, inscriptions,  cinerary  urns,  etc.,  from  the 
villas  of  Fonsega,  Montalto,  Pullucchi,  Antoninus 
Pius,  the  Justiniani  Palace,  etc.  The  staircase  was 
enriched  with  sepulchral  urns  and  numerous  Roman 
inscriptions,  and  a  very  curious  and  ancient  chair  of 
Pavonazzo  marble.  In  the  space  over  the  dining- 
room  door  was  a  bas-relief  of  a  mystical  marriage, 
When  the  marbles  were  conveyed  to  the  British 
Museum,  this  space  was  filled  up  with  a  cast  of  a 
boar  taken  from  the  celebrated  one  at  Paris.  The 
parlour  or  dressing-room  in  Park  Street  contained 
a  rich  display  of  votive  altars,  sepulchral  urns,  and 
inscriptions.       Among   the    marbles    was    a    most 


CHARLES  TOWNLEY  231 

spirited  statue  o£  a  Satyr,  the  thumb  of  whose 
right  hand  is  enclosed  between  his  two  fore-fingers  ; 
it  is  now  numbered  24  in  the  Townley  Gallery 
in  the  British  Museum,  and  this  small  but  excellent 
specimen  of  ancient  art  was  presented  to  Mr. 
Townley  by  his  friend  Lord  Cawdor.  The  ancient, 
rare,  and  truly  interesting  collection  of  terra-cottas 
brought  from  Rome  by  Nollekens,  which  has  been 
already  noticed  in  an  early  page  of  this  volume,  was 
let  into  the  walls  of  this  room.  Of  the  female 
figures  in  these  specimens  the  tasteful  Cipriani  was 
so  extremely  fond  that  he  has  been  heard  to 
declare  to  Mr.  Townley  that  they  afforded  him  so 
much  pleasure  that  he  never  knew  when  to  leave 
them. 

The  dining-parlour  looking  over  St.  James's 
Park  was  a  room  in  which  Mr.  Townley  has  enter- 
tained personages  of  the  highest  rank  in  this 
kingdom,  as  well  as  visitors  from  all  nations  who 
were  eminent  for  the  brilliancy  of  their  wit  or  their 
literary  acquirements,  and  it  contained  the  greater 
part  of  his  statues.  Here  stood  those  of  Libera, 
Isis,  Diana,  the  Discobolus,  a  drunken  Faun,  and 
an  Adonis  ;  but,  above  all,  that  most  magnificent 
one,  of  Venus,  which  measures  six  feet  four  inches 
in  height.  Mr.  Nollekens  informed  me  that,  in 
the  conveyance  of  this  statue  to  England,  the 
following  singular  stratagem  to  save  the  immense 
duty  upon  so  large  and  so  perfect  a  figure  was 
resorted  to.  In  consequence  of  it  having  been  dis- 
covered that  the  figure  had  been  carved  from  two 
blocks  and  put  together  at  the  waist,  at  the  com- 


232  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

mencement  of  the  drapery,  it  was  separated,  and 
sent  at  different  times,  so  that  the  duty  upon  each 
fragment  amounted  to  a  mere  trifle.  It  is  now 
numbered  14  in  the  Townley  Gallery  in  the  British 
Museum. 

Among  the  busts  was  that  of  Caracalla,  and  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  vases  perhaps  in  the  world. 
It  is  embellished  with  Bacchanalian  figures,  and 
was  brought  from  the  Villa  of  Antoninus,  where 
other  treasures  of  art  have  been  discovered.  Over 
the  chimney-piece  in  the  drawing-room,  looking 
into  Park  Street,  was  a  bas-relief  in  terra-cotta  of 
a  marriage  ceremony,  modelled  by  Mr.  Nollekens 
from  the  one  over  the  dining-room  door.  This 
performance  was  highly  esteemed  by  Mr.  Townley, 
who  always  spake  of  Mr.  Nollekens  as  the  first 
sculptor  of  his  day. 

The  drawing-room,  commanding  a  most  beautiful 
view  of  the  Park,  contained  principally  the  follow- 
ing heads  and  busts  :  Decebatus,  Marcus  Aurelius, 
Hadrian,  Trajan,  Hercules,  Antinous,  and  Adonis  ; 
but  of  all  others,  that  of  Isis  upon  the  Lotus  was 
considered  by  artists  to  be  one  of  the  most  perfect 
and  beautiful  specimens  of  sculpture.  It  was 
purchased  of  Prince  Laurenzano,  of  Naples,  in 
1772.  This  bust  of  Isis,  which  Mr.  Nollekens 
considered  to  be  a  portrait  of  the  sculptor's  model, 
was  so  much  admired  by  him  that  he  always  had  a 
copy  of  it  in  marble  purposely  for  sale.  The  last 
■  one  was  sold,  after  the  collection  was  purchased  by 
Government,  to  John  Townley,  Esq.,  for  one 
hundred   guineas,    who   was   delighted    to    see    so 


CHARLES  TOWNLEY  233 

exquisite  a  copy  placed  in  the  situation  which  the 
original  had  graced  for  so  many  years. 

The  same  room  also  contained  a  child  asleep, 
a  figure  of  Diana  seated,  and  a  lion's  head  with 
horns.  Of  this  last  specimen  I  have  heard  Mr. 
Chantrey  speak  in  rapturous  terms,  particularly  as 
to  the  animated  manner  in  which  the  artist  had 
used  the  drill  in  finishing  the  mane,  for  this  tool, 
when  judiciously  introduced  in  hair,  certainly  gives 
wonderful  vigour  and  depth  of  touch,  as  may  be 
seen  in  the  numerous  portraits  of  persons  of  the 
highest  rank  and  talent  produced  by  Chantrey, 
whose  busts  alone  have  secured  him  unrivalled 
fame. 

The  library  was  highly  interesting :  it  was  lighted 
from  above,  and  was  in  every  respect  an  excellent 
room  for  study.  The  marbles  in  it  were  not  so 
numerous  as  those  in  the  dining-parlour,  but  they 
consisted  of  some  choice  specimens.  Among  the 
busts  were  those  of  Antoninus  Pius,  Titan, 
Caracalla's  wife,  Plautilla,  Lucius  Verus,  and  the 
celebrated  one  of  Homer,  which  has  been  so 
repeatedly  and  admirably  engraven.  Here  were 
also  the  heads  of  Adonis,  and  that  beautiful  one 
of  a  child  with  its  locks  uncut  over  its  right 
ear,  together  with  the  exquisite  little  statue  of 
Angerona,  which  is  now  called  a  Venus,  and 
numbered  22  in  the  gallery  of  the  British  Museum. 
Mr.  Nollekens  renewed  the  arms  of  this  figure,  for 
which  restoration  I  stood  when  his  pupil. 

Mr.  Townley  was  so  enamoured  with  his  favourite 
busts  of  Isis,  Pericles,  and  Homer,  the  most  perfect 


234  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

specimens  of  ancient  art,  that  he  employed  the 
hand  of  Skelton,  Sharpe's  favourite  pupil,  to 
engrave  them  upon  a  small  plate,  which  he  used  as 
his  visiting-card.  This  elegant  performance,  always 
considered  a  great  rarity,  was  left  only  at  the 
houses  of  particular  persons,  so  that  an  impression 
of  it  is  now  greatly  coveted  by  the  collectors  of 
such  bijoux. 

Of  all  Mr.  Townley's  friends,  I  am  perfectly 
convinced  that  no  one  respected  him  more  than 
Mr.  Christie,  the  auctioneer,  and  a  member  of  the 
Dilettanti  Society,  for  whose  learning  and  classical 
acquirements  Mr.  Townley  had  the  highest  esteem, 
and  to  whom  he  always  gave  up  the  keys  of  his 
cabinets  whenever  he  visited  him.  Mr.  Townley 
was  buried  at  Burnley,  near  Townley  Hall,  in 
Lancashire  ;  and  so  much  was  he  beloved  by  the 
country  people  far  and  near,  that  as  his  hearse 
passed  the  sides  of  the  road  were  crowded  and  the 
windows  of  the  town  filled,  the  spectators  being  all 
silent  and  uncovered. 

Mr.  Townley's  bust  in  the  first  room  of  the 
Gallery  of  Antiquities  in  the  British  Museum  is 
considered  a  pretty  good  likeness,  though  the  lower 
part  of  the  face  is  certainly  too  full.  Mr.  Nollekens 
carved  it  after  Mr.  Townley's  death,  from  a  mask 
which  he  took  from  his  face.  Another  bust  by 
Nollekens,  though  by  no  means  so  good  either  in 
art  or  likeness,  has  been  bequeathed  to  the  same 
national  institution  by  the  late  Richard  Payne 
Knight,  Esq. 

The  Dilettanti  Society,  as  well  as  other  learned 


TOWNLEY' S  HOUSE  235 

men,  with  whom  Mr.  Townley  had  lived  in  the 
most  cheerful  and  instructive  intercourse,  were 
deprived  of  their  accustomed  pleasures  by  his 
death,  which  took  place  in  the  bedchamber  on  the 
second  floor  looking  over  the  Park,  on  January  3, 
1805.  In  this  room  also  died  his  uncle,  John 
Townley,  Esq.,  a  highly -respected  gentleman,  who 
had  for  many  years  been  an  eminent  collector  of 
Hollar's  works,  of  English  portraits  for  the  illus- 
tration of  Granger's  '  Biographical  History  of 
England,'  and  of  rare  and  valuable  books,  for  the 
reception  of  which  he  had  fitted  up  the  dining  and 
drawing  rooms  facing  the  Park,  with  accommodating 
galleries  all  round.  The  house  is  now  inhabited  by 
his  son,  Peregrine  Edward  Townley,  Esq.,  a  family 
trustee  of  the  British  Museum. 

This  house,  which  was  purchased  by  Mr.  Townley 
in  that  state  denominated  by  builders  !  a  shell,'  was 
finished  according  to  his  own  taste  ;  but  the  ground 
upon  which  it  stands,  as  well  as  that  of  several 
adjoining  mansions,  belongs  to  Christ's  Hospital. 
The  late  Koyal  Cockpit,  which  afforded  Hogarth 
an  excellent  scene  for  his  humour,  remained  a 
next-door  noisy  nuisance  to  Mr.  Townley  for  many 
years.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  of  this  print  of  the 
Cockpit  by  Hogarth,  as  well  as  those  of  the  Gates 
of  Calais  and  South wark  Fair,  I  have  never  seen, 
read,  nor  heard  of  an  etching,  nor  of  any  im- 
pression whatever,  with  a  variation  from  the  state 
in  which  they  were  published. 

This  is  the  more  extraordinary  as  they  are  all 
highly-finished   plates,   and   the   artist   must    have 


236  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

required  many  proofs  of  them  in  their  progress 
before  he  could  have  been  satisfied  with  their  effect, 
particularly  in  that  of  Southwark  Fair,  which,  in 
my  opinion,  is  not  only  the  deepest  studied  as  to 
composition,  and  light  and  shade,  but  the  most 
elaborately  finished,  and  perhaps  the  most  inno- 
cently entertaining  of  all  his  works.  For  great  as 
Hogarth  was  in  his  display  of  every  variety  of 
character,  I  should  never  think  of  exhibiting  a 
portfolio  of  his  prints  to  the  youthful  inquirer ;  nor 
can  I  agree  that  the  man  who  was  so  accustomed 
to  visit,  so  fond  of  delineating,  and  who  gave  up  so 
much  of  his  time  to  the  vices  of  the  most  abandoned 
classes,  was  in  truth  a  c  moral  teacher  of  mankind.' 
My  father  knew  Hogarth  well,  and  I  have  often 
heard  him  declare  that  he  revelled  in  the  company 
of  the  drunken  and  profligate — Churchill,  Wilkes, 
Hayman,  etc.,  were  among  his  constant  companions. 
Dr.  John  Hoadly,  though  in  my  opinion  it  reflected 
no  credit  on  him,  delighted  in  his  company  ;  but 
he  did  not  approve  of  all  the  prints  produced  by 
him,  particularly  that  of  the  first  state  of  c  En- 
thusiasm Displayed,'  which,  had  Mr.  Garrick  or 
Dr.  Johnson  seen,  they  could  never  for  a  moment 
have  entertained  their  high  esteem  of  so  irreligious 
a  character. 


[  237  ] 


CHAPTER  X. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  intelligence  whilst  abroad — Prints  of  Marc- Antonio — 
Distinction  of  draperies  and  flesh  in  sculpture — Dutch  tables,  and 
improvement  in  English  taste — Difficulties  attendant  on  the  lighting 
of  pieces  of  sculpture — Ignorance  of  persons  employed  to  erect  and 
repair  them. — Huge  blocks  of  marble  used  by  modern  sculptors — 
Fatal  consequences  of  piecing  the  stone — Works  of  a  mender  of 
antiques — Anecdote  of  Mr.  Whitbread — Coquetry,  death,  and  funeral 
of  Angelica  Kauffmann — Death  and  epitaph  of  Miss  Welch — Mr. 
Nollekens'  visits  to  the  Opera — Instances  of  his  economy  and  ignor- 
ance— Dog- Jennings. 

It  is  reasonable  to  expect,  in  the  course  of  repeated 
conversations  with  travellers,  or  with  persons  who 
have  resided  several  years  abroad,  some  little 
account  of  their  particular  pursuits  and  employ- 
ments, as  well  as  of  their  pleasures  and  amuse- 
ments ;  but  it  is  most  extraordinary  that  Mr. 
Nollekens'  observations  on  events  which  had 
taken  place  during  his  absence  from  England 
never  led  him  to  speak  of  works  of  sculp- 
ture unless  he  was  questioned ;  and  then  his 
answers  did  not  prove  that  he  possessed  any  depth 
of  knowledge  of  their  history.  Indeed,  they 
amounted  to  little  more  than  monosyllabic  answers, 
though   I   am   certain,    if    he   had    turned   to    his 


238  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

memorandum-books,  in  which  there  were  numerous 
sketches  of  groups,  statues,  and  busts,  with  their 
mutilations  and  measurements,  he  certainly  could 
have  afforded  much  information.  But  this  power 
he  did  not  possess  ;  nor  was  he  inclined  to  look 
them  over  until  the  later  period  of  his  life,  when 
his  mind,  had  it  ever  been  qualified,  would,  accord- 
ing to  the  decay  of  nature,  have  been  less  capable  to 
apply  them  to  any  use. 

During  the  long  period  of  my  knowledge  of  him, 
Nollekens  never  once  attempted  to  descant  upon 
the  sublimity  of  thought,  the  grandeur  of  the 
composition,  nor  the  energetic  expression  of  the 
Laocoon,  the  Apollo  Belvidere,  the  Farnese  Her- 
cules, the  Niobe,  the  Venus  de  Medici,  nor  the 
Diana  of  Ephesus.  Nor  did  he  ever  appear  to  have 
an  inclination  to  collect  the  rise,  progress,  and 
history  of  his  art.  A  Babylonian  seal  with  him 
would  have  been  a  thing  of  no  further  estimation 
than  for  its  colour  as  a  stone.  A  figure  with  its 
legs  and  feet  closed  together  was  never  noticed  by 
him  as  the  first  attempt  of  Egyptian  sculpture,  nor 
was  he  aware  that  the  projection  of  one  leg  before 
the  other  was  their  first  step  to  action,  nor  that  the 
arms  of  two  seated  figures,  male  and  female,  across 
each  other's  back  was  the  first  instance  of  grouping 
with  the  Egyptians.  He  knew  very  little  as  to  the 
introduction  of  Grecian  art  into  Rome  ;  though  he 
was  certainly  pretty  well  informed  as  to  the  works 
of  Michael  Angelo  and  John  di  Bologna,  yet,  at  the 
same  time,  he  expressed  himself  with  as  much  plea- 
sure when  he  saw  Bernini's  group  in  the  coachhouse 


ENGRA  VINOS  239 


of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  as  he  possibly  could  with 
the  productions  of  the  two  preceding  great  men. 

Nollekens'  usual  communications  to  his  friends 
were  the  number  of  miles  from  Rome  to  Loretto  ; 
the  names  of  persons  who  walked  together  on  a 
very  hot  day  ;  that  Mr.  Dalton's1  conduct  towards 
Mr.  Strange,2  the  engraver,  was  shamefully  cruel ; 
that  little  Crone,3  the  landscape-draughtsman,  who 
was  employed  to  collect  prints  in  Rome  for  Mr. 
Mangin,  of  Dublin,  was  much  ridiculed  by  the 
natives  on  account  of  his  deformity  ;  or  that  such 
a  Cardinal  feigned  a  consumptive  cough  at  the  time 
of  an  election  for  a  Pope.  One  curious  anecdote, 
however,  he  frequently  related  when  showing  his 
prints — namely,  that  when  he  was  at  Rome,  at  the 
fair  time,  the  original  plates  engraved  by  Marc- 
Antonio  were  printed  for  the  bystanders  at  a 
shilling  an  hour,  the  employer  finding  ink  and 
paper  ;  and  that  the  eagerness  with  which  these 
worn-out  and  repeatedly  touched-up  publications  of 
Antonio  Salamanca  were  collected  induced  the 
visitors  to  cry  out  :  '  The  next  shilling's  worth  is 
for  me  ;'  or, '  It  is  my  turn  now.'  This  will  at  once 
account  for  the  great  quantity  of  bad  impressions 
from  Marc-Antonio's  plates  which  are  now  in 
existence. 

Much  has  frequently  been  said  by  those  persons 
who  understand  little  of  the  matter  respecting  the 

1  Richard  Dalton  (1720-1791),  eEgraver  and  surveyor  of  the  royal 
pictures  to  George  III. — Ed. 

2  Sir  Robert  Strange  (1721-1792).— Ed. 

3  Robert  Crone.  He  was  an  epileptic,  and  died  in  a  fit  in  1799. 
—Ed. 


240  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

practice  of  modern  sculptors,  as  it  regards  the 
manner  in  which  the  texture  of  the  respective 
materials  they  represent  should  be  carved.  They 
insist  that  no  attempt  to  particularize  any  specific 
substance  should  be  made,  but  that  every  descrip- 
tion of  drapery  should  be  treated  alike,  whether 
linen,  silk,  or  woollen — so  that  it  be  drapery  it  is 
enough.  Another  states  that  the  silk  drapery  given 
by  Eoubiliac  to  the  statue  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton  at 
Cambridge  is  more  often  admired  than  the  other 
parts  of  the  figure  ;  and  this  may  probably  be  the 
case,  as  the  ideas  of  those  persons  who  praise  the 
statue  for  its  silk  mantle  are  confined  to  texture 
only.  But  surely  it  would  have  been  highly  im- 
proper if  Roubiliac  had  given  folds  like  those  of 
linen  or  woollen,  when  he  knew  that  he  had  to 
represent  silk. 

Chantrey's  busts  are  valuable,  in  addition  to  their 
astonishing  strength  of  natural  character,  for  the 
fleshy  manner  in  which  he  has  treated  them,  which 
every  real  artist  knows  to  be  the  most  difficult  part 
of  the  sculptor's  task.  Surely  the  man  of  taste, 
after  he  has  admired  and  spoken  of  the  fleshiness 
of  a  figure,  would  not  think  of  blaming  the  sculptor 
for  attending  to  the  manner  in  which  he  had  carved 
the  ermine  of  a  king's  robe,  the  lawn  sleeves  of  a 
bishop's  rochet,  the  silk  riband  of  an  order  of 
knighthood,  or  the  woollen  coat  of  an  admiral. 
Each  of  these  articles  should  be  precisely  attended 
to,  or  they  will  not  remind  us  of  the  things  which 
they  are  intended  to  represent ;  and  if  the  sculptor 
were  wholly  inattentive  to  texture,  many  a  lawyer 


FLESH  IN  MARBLE  241 

would  be  deprived  of  his  silk  gown.  Suppose  the 
artist  had  to  carve  a  negro's  woolly  head,  should 
the  hair  be  as  sleek  and  oily  as  his  skin  ?  In  my 
opinion,  unquestionably  not  ;  nor  should  the  foam 
of  the  fiery  steed  be  glossy  like  its  coat.  The  flesh 
of  that  truly  beautiful  figure  of  Charity,  by  West- 
macott,  now  in  his  studio,  is  powerfully  and  properly 
contrasted  by  the  coarseness  of  the  dowlas  drapery 
with  which  he  has  covered  her  limbs  ;  and  perhaps 
I  cannot  point  out  a  more  striking  instance  of  the 
unequivocal  influence  of  contrast  than  that  which  is 
displayed  in  this  figure. 

Nollekens,  great  as  he  certainly  was  as  a  sculptor 
of  busts,  never  produced  that  lively  fleshiness  which 
we  see  so  pre-eminently  attended  to  by  the  best 
English  sculptors  of  the  present  day  ;  and  yet  he 
was  fully  aware  of  its  beauty  and  high  importance, 
for  I  have  often  heard  him  observe,  when  anyone 
was  looking  at  an  antique  head  of  a  Faun,  which 
was  afterwards  purchased  at  his  sale  by  his  Grace 
the  Duke   of  Newcastle,  that    he  never  saw  flesh 
better  represented  in  marble,  and  that  it  was  for 
that  great  excellence  he  bought  it.     But   though 
texture  of  the  mechanical  materials  is  by  no  means 
to  be  neglected,  it  can  be  viewed  by  an  intellectual 
person  in  a  secondary  light  only  ;  and  it  has  often 
of  late  years  given  me  great  pleasure  to  observe 
that  the  same  class  of  persons,  who  in  my  boyish 
days  would  admire  a  bleeding-heart  cherry  painted 
upon  a  Pontipool  tea-board,  or  a  Tradescant  straw- 
berry upon  a  Dutch  table,1  now  attentively  look, 

1  This  description  of  table,  the  pride  of  our  great-grandmothers,  in 
which  the  brightest  colours  were  most  gorgeously  displayed,  was  first 

16 


242  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

and  for  a  long  time,  too,  with  the  most  awful 
respect  at  the  majestic  fragments  of  the  Greek 
sculptors'  art  so  gloriously  displayed  in  the  Elgin 
Gallery.  These  are  indeed  treasures,  the  merits 
of  which,  in  my  humble  opinion,  men  of  the  first 
talent,  however  powerful  might  be  their  command 
of  words,  would  find  themselves  at  least  inadequate 
to  describe. 

There  is  one  truly  lamentable  disadvantage  to 
which  the  works  of  our  best  sculptors  are  frequently 
exposed,  namely,  the  want  of  a  good  light,  without 
which  their  labours  cannot  be  viewed  with  that 
essential  assistance  which  the  painter's  productions 
can  in  most  instances  procure. 

The  exquisitely-finished  and  numerous  beauties 
of  a  cabinet-picture  can  at  all  times  be  appreciated 
by  placing  it  in  its  proper  light  upon  an  easel  as  the 
artist  painted  it,  and  intended  it  should  be  viewed  ; 
and  a  large  picture  may  be  hung  in  a  gallery  under 
a  certain  admission  of  light  falling  upon  it,  accord- 
ing to  the  arrangement  and  intention  of  the  artist. 
For  the  old  historical  painters  always  considered 
very  attentively  the  portion  and  power  of  light,  as 
well  as  the  precise  time  it  would  fall  upon  those 

imported  from  Holland  into  England  in  the  reign  of  William  and 
Mary.  The  top  was  nothing  more  than  a  large  oval  tea-tray,  with  a 
raised  scalloped  border  round  it,  fixed  upon  a  pillar,  having  a  claw  of 
three  legs.  They  are  now  and  then  to  be  met  with  in  our  good  old- 
fashioned  family  mansions,  and  brokers'  shops. 

They  were  formerly  considered  by  our  aunts  Deborah  to  be  such 
an  ornament  to  a  room  that,  in  order  to  exhibit  them  to  advantage, 
they  were  put  up  in  the  corner  of  a  waiting-parlour  for  the  admira- 
tion of  the  country  tenants  when  they  brought  their  rents,  or  sat 
waiting  their  turn  for  an  order  for  coals  in  a  severe  winter. — Smith. 


SCULPTURE  IN  CHURCHES  243 

parts  of  the  walls  to  which  their  labours  were 
destined,  and  they  painted  their  pictures  either 
brighter  or  darker,  modestly  low  or  powerfully 
strong,  according  to  existing  or  adventitious  cir- 
cumstances. Sometimes,  however,  when  they  were 
unavoidably  compelled  to  occupy  a  gloomy  recess 
in  a  small  chapel,  illumined  only  by  a  borrowed  or 
a  reflected  light,  they  first  of  all  considered  the 
angle  of  reflection  under  which  their  performances 
could  be  best  seen,  and  then  painted  their  picture  so 
as  to  meet  it. 

The  sculptor,  on  the  contrary,  unaided  by 
colours,  has  perhaps  either  too  much  or  too  little 
light  for  his  monument,  and  is  often  obliged  to 
erect  it  where  there  is  hardly  any  at  all,  because 
that  part  of  the  church  belongs  to  the  family,  or 
they  insist  upon  having  it  as  near  as  possible  to 
their  pew,  which  has  always  gone  with  the  mansion 
they  reside  in  ;  thus  enshrouding  themselves  in 
their  own  primitive  importance  in  the  parish,  at  the 
same  time,  perhaps,  being  totally  ignorant  of  the 
effect  of  a  masterpiece  of  art,  upon  which  they 
have  expended  a  considerable  sum  ;  or  not  in  any 
way  evincing  an  interest  for  the  fame  of  the  artist 
employed,  whose  reputation  has  invited  travellers 
to  visit  the  church,  which  is  often  a  great  source  of 
pleasure  to  the  tourist. 

I  remember  that  Flaxman,  after  he  had  put  up 
his  monument  to  the  memory  of  Lord  Mansfield  in 
Westminster  Abbey,  applied  to  the  Dean  for  per- 
mission to  cover  a  small  portion  of  a  window  with 
a  gray  colour,  in  order  to  shut  out  an  unpleasant 


244  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

glare  of  light ;  but  the  Dean,  to  the  great  mortifica- 
tion of  the  sculptor,  would  not  comply  with  the 
request.  Nollekens  seldom  knew,  nor,  indeed,  did 
any  of  the  English  sculptors  of  former  days  care, 
in  what  part  of  a  country  church  their  monuments 
were  to  be  placed  ;  they  received  the  measurements 
of  the  space  they  were  to  occupy  from  the  family, 
who  had  them  from  the  carpenter,  who  was  not 
at  all  times  very  correct,  without  any  notice  of  the 
aspect,  or  stating  whether  the  space  were  over  or 
under  a  window,  or  against  a  pier,  or  near  the  altar, 
receiving  a  vertical  light  or  a  diagonal  one  ;  and 
upon  this  carelessly-measured  order  the  sculptor 
proceeded,  never  dreaming  that  his  work  was  to  be 
placed  close  to  the  vestry-door  in  a  dark  corner. 
Then,  too,  when  it  was  up,  the  plasterer  was  to 
adorn  it  with  a  neat  jet-black  border  of  a  foot  in 
width  !  so  that  it  should  match  unostentatiously 
with  a  monument  on  the  opposite  side,  in  an  equally 
forlorn  situation,  belonging  to  a  family  with  whom 
the  relatives  of  the  last  deceased  had  been  for  ages 
inveterately  at  variance  ;  whilst,  to  crown  the  whole 
of  this  unhappy  injury  to  art,  the  putting  up  was 
generally  entrusted  to  a  mason,  who,  upon  his 
return  to  London,  was  rarely  questioned  as  to  where 
it  was  erected,  or  as  to  how  it  looked. 

To  the  praise  of  the  artists,  and  the  improved 
taste  of  their  employers  of  the  present  day,  there  is 
very  little  of  that  monumental  jobbing  now  per- 
mitted ;  the  aspect  and  situation  are  first  seen  and 
considered,  accurate  measurements  are  then  made, 
and  the  sculptor  either  sends  his  own  experienced 


SCULPTURE  245 


assistants  from  London  to  erect  it,  or  superintends 
it  himself.  And  here  I  consider  it  my  duty  to 
state,  notwithstanding  what  I  have  said  of  a  late 
Dean  of  Westminster,  that  even  the  country  clergy 
of  the  present  day,  from  their  more  general  know- 
ledge of  works  of  art,  are,  with  very  few  exceptions, 
both  willing  and  desirous  of  affording  the  sculptor 
every  possible  assistance  in  their  power,  either  by 
shutting  out  obtrusive  li^ht,  or  admitting:  a  greater 
flood  of  it  where  the  artist  may  consider  it  beneficial. 
I  have  also  infinite  pleasure  in  being  able  to  state 
that  our  present  sculptors  of  eminence  will  not 
submit  to  the  directions  of  the  ignorant  employer 
to  the  deterioration  of  their  productions,  however 
powerful  his  station  in  life  may  be.  It  would  be 
as  well  if  our  dressers  for  theatrical  representations 
would  be  as  honestly  firm,  and  not  attend  to  the 
ridiculous  gew-gaw  directions  of  an  obstinate 
manager  ;  we  should  then  stand  a  good  chance  of 
seeing  the  true  costume  of  place  and  period,  instead 
of  being  obliged  to  sit  out  a  play  grossly  defective 
in  almost  every  scene. 

Of  the  mode  of  producing  a  figure  by  what 
Nollekens  called  manoeuvring  the  marble,  and 
making  it  up  of  bits,  our  modern  sculptors  so  com- 
pletely disapprove  that  they  have  even  worked 
nearly  the  whole  of  the  groups  of  their  monuments 
erected  in  St.  Paul's  Cathedral  out  of  one  piece  of 
marble  ;  and  so  immense  are  the  blocks  now  im- 
ported into  England  for  works  of  sculpture,  that 
at  this  moment  Mr.  Chantrey  has  one  weighing 
many   tons,    for   which    he    paid   about   the    sum 


246  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

of  £600.  Flaxman's  last  and  truly  grand  work 
of  St.  Michael  overpowering  Satan,  which  he 
executed  for  the  Earl  of  Egremont's  noble  gallery 
of  modern  sculpture  at  Petworth,  is  likewise  of  one 
block  ;  and  this  is  also  the  universal  practice  with 
all  the  other  eminent  sculptors.  Westmacott's 
charming  group  of  Venus  and  Cupid,  which  he 
is  now  executing  for  the  same  liberal  nobleman, 
is  from  one  block  ;  and  Rossi's  truly  vigorous  and 
masterly  figure  of  the  Boxer,  just  finished  for  the 
same  gallery,  is  likewise  cut  out  of  one  piece,  as 
well  as  Bailey's  animated  statue  of  Earl  St.  Vincent, 
executed  by  order  of  Government. 

And  here  I  must  earnestly  request  the  reader, 
who  may  not  at  present  be  acquainted  with  the 
names  of  other  sculptors,  not  to  suppose  for  a 
moment  that  I  confine  these  remarks  to  the  members 
of  the  Royal  Academy.  I  should  then  consider 
myself  unworthy  of  the  esteem  of  many  young 
artists,  whose  works  are  shining  ornaments  to  their 
country,  and  who  must  ultimately  fill  the  honour- 
able seats  of  the  present  members  ;  but  as  there 
are  tares  amongst  the  wheat,  I  considered  it  better 
to  confine  myself  to  those  individuals  only  who 
have  been  acknowledged  by  so  honourable  a  body 
as  the  Royal  Academy,  fully  trusting  that  the 
time  will  arrive  when  I  shall  more  extensively  have 
it  in  my  power  to  hand  down  a  list  of  the  pro- 
ductions of  some  of  them  with  as  much  pleasure 
and  impartiality  as  I  have  those  who  at  present  so 
deservedly  flourish  under  the  distinguished  appella- 
tion of  Royal  Academicians. 


MASONS  247 


To  return  to  the  subject,  however,  I  should 
observe  that  the  disadvantages  of  piecing  the 
marble  are  often  obvious,  even  to  the  most  common 
observer  ;  as  may  be  seen  in  many  instances,  where 
either  the  cramps  have  burst  or  given  way,  or, 
from  their  not  having  been  properly  covered  with 
resin,  the  iron  has  so  corroded  the  marble  as 
entirely  to  disfigure  some  of  our  finest  works  of 
art.  Another  great  objection  which  may  be 
adduced  to  the  joining  of  marble  is  that,  where  the 
joints  are  made  in  preponderating  parts,  it  usually 
happens  that  they  give  way,  fall,  and  are  broken. 
And  even  this  is  not  all,  for  sometimes,  when  such 
an  accident  happens  at  a  great  distance  from  the 
capital,  the  seat  of  most  of  our  eminent  artists,  the 
common  mason  of  the  district  is  called  in  to  reset 
the  head  or  a  broken  limb — a  fellow  perhaps  who, 
with  all  the  kindred  and  impenetrable  hardness  of 
his  own  granite,  as  soon  as  he  is  admitted  into  your 
presence,  puts  his  mallet-hand  to  his  side  in  readi- 
ness to  pull  out  his  two-foot  rule,  which  he  is 
always  sure  to  open  at  a  right  angle  before  he 
answers  or  even  hears  the  question  ;  and  then, 
immediately  after  rubbing  the  back  of  his  right 
ear  and  most  accurately  measuring  the  fractured 
parts,  hits  upon  a  plan  of  cutting  out  the  mutila- 
tions by  taking  about  three  inches  from  the  arm  of 
the  statue !  The  very  thoughts  of  such  masonic 
masters  of  the  craft  paint  to  my  imagination  the 
sort  of  fellow  he  must  have  been  who  put  the  left- 
hand  glove  upon  the  right  hand  of  the  effigy  of 
Guy    Faux,  in  Hogarth's  humorously-entertaining 


248  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

print,  illustrative  of  Huclibras,  called  the  c  Burning 
of  the  Rumps.' 

.  However,  should  any  of  my  readers  exclaim 
with  Osric,  c  A  hit,  a  very  palpable  hit !'  I  could, 
in  compassion  to  those  who  blindly  employ  these 
masonic  followers  of  Praxiteles,  relate  several 
things  equally  good  of  a  wealthy  man  of  some 
family,  who  turns  his  back  upon  all  modern 
sculpture  in  consequence  of  his  having  been  at 
Athens  ;  and  because  he  has  become  the  happy 
possessor  of  some  of  the  worst  fragments  of  the 
antique  in  this  kingdom,  employs  a  mere  mason  to 
put  them  together,  and  is  perfectly  satisfied,  though 
a  right  foot  has  been  most  ingeniously  placed  upon 
a  left  leg!  Indeed,  so  fond  is  he  of  the  antique, 
that  I  have  known  him  to  order  his  bungler  to 
match  a  head  with  the  best  body  he  could  find  in 
the  mass  of  his  dearly-acquired  treasures,  and  then 
to  carve  new  limbs  to  match  out  of  those  that  were 
too  large  for  other  purposes,  so  that  he  might  have 
precisely  the  same  stone.  He  is  well  acquainted 
with  the  quarries  whence  the  marble  of  such  and 
such  a  figure  was  taken,  and  is  also  quite  perfect 
in  recollecting  the  names  of  ancient  marbles. 

Mr.  Nollekens  informed  me  that  the  late  Mr. 
Samuel  Whitbread  bought  two  fragments  of  antique, 
statues  of  him  for  £200,  and  that  the  man  sent  by 
Mr.  Whitbread  to  pack  them  up  for  the  country 
used  screws  instead  of  nails.  c  Why,'  said  Mr. 
Nollekens,  '  do  you  use  screws,  when  nails  would 
answer  every  purpose?'  'Lord,  sir!'  exclaimed 
the  carpenter,  i  I  used  screws  to  all  the  cases  for 


ANGELICA  KAUFFMAAN  249 


the  Piccadilly  leaden  figures !'  The  fact  was  this  : 
a  man  in  the  Borough  had  purchased  the  greater 
number  of  Cheere's  leaden  figures  at  the  auction 
in  Piccadilly.  Mr.  Whitbread  bought  nearly  the 
whole  of  him,  and  had  them  put  up  and  sent  to  his 
pleasure-grounds,  with  as  much  caution  as  if  they 
had  been  looking-glasses  of  the  greatest  dimensions 
for  his  drawing-room. 

The  reader  will  probably  recollect  the  manner 
in  which  Angelica  Kauffmann  was  imposed  upon 
by  a  gentleman's  servant,  who  married  her  under 
the  name  of  Count  Horn,  and  the  way  in  which 
his  treachery  was  discovered,  as  related  in  the 
early  part  of  this  volume.  Angelica,  however, 
was  universally  considered  as  a  coquette,  so  that 
we  cannot  deeply  sympathize  in  her  disappoint- 
ment ;  and  as  a  proof  how  justly  she  deserved 
that  character,  I  shall  give  an  anecdote  which 
I  have  often  heard  Mr.  Nollekens  relate.  When 
Angelica  was  at  Rome,  previously  to  her  marriage, 
she  was  ridiculously  fond  of  displaying  her 
person  and  being  admired,  for  which  purpose  she 
one  evening  took  her  station  in  one  of  the  most 
conspicuous  boxes  of  the  theatre,  accompanied 
by  Nathaniel  Dance  and  another  artist,  both  of 
whom,  as  well  as  many  others,  were  desperately 
enamoured  of  her.  Angelica  perhaps  might  have 
recollected  the  remonstrance  of  Mrs.  Peachum, 
where  she  says  : 

'  Oh,  Polly,  you  might  have  toy'd  and  kiss'd  : 
By  keeping  men  off  you  keep  them  on.' 

However,  while  she  was  standing  between  her  two 


250  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

beaux,  and  finding  an  arm  of  each  most  lovingly 
embracing  her  waist,  she  contrived,  whilst  her  arms 
were  folded  before  her  on  the  front  of  the  box 
over  which  she  was  leaning,  to  squeeze  the  hand 
of  both,  so  that  each  lover  concluded  himself 
beyond  all  doubt  the  man  of  her  choice. 

On  page  20  of  Mr.  Prince  Hoare's  '  Academic 
Annals  for  1808 '  is  recorded  the  following  com- 
munication which  was  made  to  the  members  of  the 
Koyal  Academy  : 

'  December  23rd. — In  the  General  Assembly  the  President  declared 
the  decease  of  Angelica  Kauffmann  Zucchi.  one  of  the  Members  of  the 
Academy.5 

The  account  of  the  loss  of  this  distinguished 
artist  was  received  in  a  letter  from  Dr.  Borsi,  of 
Rome,  who,  after  relating  the  circumstances  of  her 
illness  and  death,  which  happened  on  November  5 
previous,  proceeds  to  describe  her  obsequies, 
celebrated  in  the  Church  of  S.  Andrea  cle'  Frati, 
under  the  direction  of  the  sculptor  Canova  and 
others  of  her  friends.  '  The  church,'  savs  Dr. 
Borsi,  '  was  decorated  in  the  manner  customary  on 
the  interment  of  those  of  noble  family.  At  ten  in 
the  morning  the  corpse  was  accompanied  to  the 
church  by  two  very  numerous  fraternities,  fifty 
Capuchins  and  fifty  priests.  The  bier  was  carried 
by  some  of  the  brotherhood,  and  the  four  corners 
of  the  pall  were  supported  by  four  young  ladies, 
dressed  suitably  to  the  occasion.  The  four  tassels 
were  held  by  the  four  principal  members  of  the 
Academy  of  St.  Luke  ;  these  were  followed  by  the 
rest  of  the  Academicians  and  other  virtuosi,  each 


ANNE  WELCH  251 


one  with  a  large  wax-taper  lighted  in  his  hand. 
Two  pictures,  painted  by  the  deceased,  completed 
the  procession.' 

After  the  death  of  the  footman  who  had  married 
Angelica,  and  to  whom  she  had  allowed  a  separate 
maintenance,  she  became  the  wife  of  Zucchi,  the 
painter,  but  continued  to  go  by  the  name  of 
Angelica  Kauffmann. 

Mrs.  Nollekens  at  this  time  received  a  most 
severe  and  unexpected  shock  by  the  death  of  her 
sister,  Miss  Welch,  with  whom  she  had  always 
lived  in  ties  of  the  fondest  love,  paying  the  strictest 
respect  to  every  observation  or  wish  she  uttered, 
according  to  the  early  advice  given  her  by  their 
mutual  friend,  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson,  who  generally 
spoke  of  Miss  Welch  as  Miss  Nancy.  She  died  at 
Bath,  and  was  buried  in  the  abbey  of  that  city, 
where  an  inscription  was  erected  as  follows  : 

1  Sacred  to  the  Memory  of  Mrs.  Anne  Welch, 
of  Aylesbury,  in  the  County  of  Bucks, 
Daughter  of  Saunders  Welch,  Esq. 
1  Admired  by  her  friends,  beloved  by  her  acquaintance,  blessed  with 
distinguished  abilities,  she  was  so   improved   by  the  knowledge  of 
various  languages  and  science,  that   elegance  of  diction,  beauty  of 
sentiment,  the  majesty  of  wisdom,  and  the  grace  of  persuasion,  ever 
hung  upon  her  lips.     The  bonds  of  life  being  gradually  dissolved,  she 
winged  her  flight  from   this  world  in   expectation  of  a   better  on 
the  15th  of  January,  1810. 

'Her  afflicted  and  affectionate  sister,  Maria  Nollekens,  in  full 
assurance  of  their  happy  reunion,  caused  this  monument  to  be 
erected.' 1 

I  am  at  present  ignorant  of  the  name  of  the 
author  of  the  above  inscription  ;  but  allowing  Mrs. 

1  For  this  copy  of  Miss  Welch's  inscription  I  am  obliged  to  my 
amiable  friend  Mrs.  Gwillim. — Smith. 


252         NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Nollekens  to  have  breathed  only  half  the  feelings 
it  sets  forth,  we  shall  be  giving  that  lady  credit  for 
great  forbearance,  as  her  cousin,  Mr.  Woodcock, 
has  informed  me  that  she  was  much  chagrined  upon 
finding  that  her  sister's  house  at  Aylesbury,  with 
its  furniture,  had  been  but  a  short  time  before  her 
death  willed  to  another  person. 

I  have  spoken  of  the  partiality  of  Nollekens  for 
the  Italian  Opera,  at  which  place  of  amusement  he 
used  to  exhibit  himself  in  his  sword  and  bag  in  the 
pit  to  hear  Grrassini  sing,  though,  at  the  same  time, 
he  was  so  ignorant  of  music  that  he  could  not  have 
discovered  any  difference  between  the  major  and 
minor  keys.  The  portion  of  the  performance 
which  really  attracted  him  was,  I  doubt  not,  the 
agile  movements  of  the  female  dancers  in  the  ballet. 
He  was  at  that  time  so  well  known  at  the  opera- 
house,  that  several  of  the  military,  who  had  an  eye 
to  his  property,  would  attend  him,  though  in  their 
full  uniform,  to  the  door  to  see  him  safe  into  a 
hackney-coach,  an  expense  he  indulged  in  only 
when  it  rained  hard.  If,  however,  the  reader  be 
surprised  at  this,  what  will  he  say  when  he  is 
informed  that  on  the  following  morning  he  was 
sometimes  seen  disputing  with  the  cobbler,  his 
opposite  neighbour,  about  the  charge  of  twopence, 
and  refusing  to  pay  Crispin's  demand  unless  he  put 
three  or  four  more  sparables  in  the  heels  of  the 
shoes  which  he  had  mended  twice  before ! 

One  day  Mr,  Northcote  the  Academician,  the 
best  and  favourite  pupil  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds, 
had  just  reached  his  door  in  Argyle  Street,  when 


NOLLEKENS'  SPELLING  253 

Nollekens,  who  was  looking  up  at  the  house,  put 
the  following  question  to  him :  i  Why  don't  you  have 
your  house  painted,  Northcote  ?  Why,  it's  as  dirty 
as  Jem  Barry's  was  in  Castle  Street.  I  wonder 
Beverly  would  let  him  live  in  it !'  Now,  Nollekens 
had  no  right  to  exult  over  his  brother  artist  in 
this  way,  for  he  had  given  his  own  door  a  coat  of 
paint,  and  his  front  passage  a  whitewash,  only  the 
day  before,  and  they  had  been  for  years  in  the  most 
filthy  state  possible. 

Miss  Welch  brought  down  upon  herself  his 
eternal  hatred  by  kindly  venturing  to  improve  him 
in  his  spelling.  She  was  a  friendly  and  benevolent 
woman,  and  I  am  indebted  to  her  and  the  amiable 
Mrs.  Barker  for  many  acts  of  kindness  during  the 
time  I  was  labouring  under  a  tremendous  loss  by 
fire.  One  evening,  when  I  was  drinking  tea  with 
her  at  her  lodgings,  No.  69  in  Newman  Street,  she 
showed  me  a  little  book  in  which  she  had  put  down 
Mr.  Nollekens'  way  of  spelling  words  in  1780,  with 
the  manner  in  which  they  should  be  written.  I 
copied  a  few  of  them  with  her  permission,  which,  I 
must  say,  she  gave  me  with  some  reluctance,  not- 
withstanding she  disliked  Nollekens  most  cordially, 
though  they  were  both  Catholics.  The  following 
instances  may  serve  as  specimens  :  '  Yousual, 
scenceble,  obligin,  modle,  wery,  gentilman,  promist, 
sarvices,  desier,  Inglish,  perscription,  hardently, 
jenerly,  moust,  devower,  Jellis,  Retier,  sarved, 
themselfs,  could  for  cold,  clargeman,  facis,  cupple, 
foure,  sun  for  son,  boath  sexis,  daly,  horsis,  ladie, 
cheif,  talkin,  tould,  shee,  sarch,  paing,  ould  mades, 


254  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

racis,  yoummer  in  his  face,  palas,  oke,  lemman, 
are-bolloon,  sammon,  chimisters  for  chemists,  yoke 
for  yolk,  grownd,'  etc. 

Let  me,  however,  entreat  my  readers  to  believe 
that  I  detest  the  character  of  a  critic  of  words,  and 
that  my  only  motive  of  touching  upon  Mr.  Nolle - 
kens'  ignorance  in  the  year  1780  is  to  induce 
them  to  believe  that,  when  he  made  so  many 
codicils  above  forty  years  afterwards,  he  did  not 
know  the  true  meaning  of  many  words  that  we  now 
and  then  find  in  testamentary  writings.  A  curious 
specimen  or  two  will  be  given  in  a  future  page  of 
this  work  of  his  ignorance  of  the  true  meaning  of 
words  pronounced  by  him,  even  at  a  moment  when 
most  persons  believed  him  to  be  perfectly  sane. 

Towards  the  close  of  one  of  the  hottest  days  in 
summer,  as  Mr.  Nollekens  was  returning  from  the 
bench  placed  in  front  of  the  Queen's  Head  and 
Artichoke  as  a  seat  for  those  persons  whose  dress 
did  not  appear  to  entitle  them  to  accommodation 
withinside  the  house,  he  asked  his  man  Dodimy 
Avhat  charitable  actions  he  had  done  lately. 
'  Charity,  sir  ?  Bless  you  !  it's  a  long  time  since 
you  gave  any.'  4  Well,  then,'  said  his  master,  '  take 
the  twopence  out  of  your  waistcoat-pocket  that  you 
had  in  change  from  the  ale  to  that  poor  fellow 
walking  there.'  '  What,  to  that  little  man  in  the 
brown  coat  ?'  '  Yes,  sir,  to  that  little  man  in  the 
brown  coat.'  '  Lord  bless  you  !  that's  Dog-Jen- 
nings !'  This  eccentric  gentleman,  who  was  a 
person  of  high  taste  and  considerable  family 
fortune,  received  this  name  from  his  having  brought 


DOG-JENNINGS  255 


into  England  an  antique  sculpture  of  a  dog,  with 
several  other  fine  pieces  of  art,  which  were  sold  by 
auction  by  the  elder  Christie.  The  dog  brought 
one  thousand  guineas,  and  was  purchased  by  Mr. 
Buncombe,  of  Yorkshire  ;  but  a  mould  of  it  be- 
longs to  Sarti,  the  figure-maker,  a  cast  from  which 
makes  a  most  noble  appearance  in  a  gentleman's 
hall.  Nollekens :  c  What  !  my  old  friend,  Noel 
Jennings  ?  What  the  devil  does  he  do  on  this  side 
of  the  water  in  Marybone  Fields  ?  Does  he  look 
this  way  ?'  '  No,  sir,'  was  the  reply.  c  Ah,  well, 
then,  walk  on  this  side  ;  don't  let  him  see  me. 
Why,  Mrs.  Palmer  left  him  a  good  piece  of  the 
pigeon-pie  last  Sunday,  when  she  made  a  day  of  it. 
I  paid  the  coach  for  both  of  us  ;  and  Jennings, 
according  to  custom,  produced  a  bottle  of  cham- 
pagne.' '  I  know,  sir,'  rejoined  Dodimy  ;  '  I  heard 
Mrs.  Nollekens  tell  Mary  all  about  it  ;  and,  I  can 
tell  you,  mistress  don't  half  like  such  ramblings.' 


[256] 


CHAPTER  XL 

The  Elgin  marbles  brought  to  England  —  Inquiries  on  them  by  a 
Committee  of  the  House  of  Commons,  with  answers  by  Nollekens, 
Flaxman,  Westmacott,  Chantrey,  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,  and 
President  West — Remarks  on  them  by  a  riding-master — Contrast 
of  the  manners  of  Nollekens  and  Flaxman — Collection  of  medals 
made  by  the  latter—Old  medals  of  Italy,  and  those  by  Pisano — 
English  medals  by  T.  Simon— French  medals  of  Andrieu — Coins 
collected  by  Mr.  Nollekens — His  loss  by  robbery — His  prints,  gems, 
and  casts  in  plaster — Art  not  hereditary. 

When  Lord  Elgin's  marbles  arrived  in  England, 
his  lordship  invited  all  persons  of  taste  to  view 
them  at  his  house,  the  corner  of  Park  Lane,  in 
Piccadilly,  now  the  town  residence  of  his  Koyal 
Highness  the  Duke  of  Gloucester.  They  were 
shortly  afterwards  moved  to  the  side  premises  of 
Burlington  House,  where  they  remained  until  a 
temporary  gallery  could  be  prepared  for  them  in  the 
British  Museum  by  Government,  which  had  pur- 
chased them  for  the  use  of  the  public  and  the 
advancement  of  art.  During  the  time  these  marbles 
were  Lord  Elgin's  property,  Mr.  Nollekens,  accom- 
panied by  his  constant  companion,  Joseph  Bonomi 
— a  truly  amiable  youth,  to  whom  from  his  birth 
he  had  intended  to  be  a  benefactor — paid  them  many 


THE  ELGIN  MARBLES  257 

visits  ;  and,  indeed,  at  that  time  not  only  all  the 
great  artists,  but  every  lover  of  the  arts,  were 
readily  admitted.  The  students  of  the  Royal 
Academy,  and  even  Flaxman,  the  Phidias  of  our 
times,  and  the  venerable  President  West,  drew  from 
them  for  weeks  together. 

As  the  mention  of  these  marbles  may  bring  to  my 
readers  the  recollection  of  events  which  some  of 
them  may  have  nearly  forgotten,  I  shall  now  intro- 
duce Mr.  Nollekens'  answers  to  the  Committee  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  contrasted  with  those  of 
Flaxman,  together  with  a  few  of  those  of  Sir 
Thomas  Lawrence  and  other  great  men  of  the 
highest  eminence  in  our  countrv,  who  were  called 
upon  for  their  opinion  as  to  the  excellence  of  those 
wonderful  works  of  art : 

Chairman  of  the  Committee. — 'Mr.  Nollekens,  are  you  well  acquainted 
with  the  collection  of  marbles  brought  to  England  by  Lord  Elgin  ?'— 
'  I  am.' 

'  What  is  your  opinion  of  those  marbles,  as  to  the  excellency  of  the 
work  ? — '  They  are  very  fine — the  finest  things  that  ever  came  to  this 
country.' 

*  In  what  class  do  you  place  them,  as  compared  with  the  finest 
marbles  which  you  have  seen  formerly  in  Italy?' — '  I  compare  them 
to  the  finest  of  Italy.' 

'Which  of  those  of  my  Lord  Elgin's  do  you  hold  in  the  highest 
estimation  ?' — '  I  hold  the  Theseus  and  the  Neptune  to  be  two  of  the 
finest  things — finer  than  anything  in  this  country.' 

'  In  what  class  do  you  place  the  bas-reliefs  ?' — '  They  are  very  fine 
— among  the  first  class  of  bas-relief  work.' 

'  Do  you  think  that  the  bas-reliefs  of  the  Centaurs  are  in  the  finest 
class  of  art  ?' — '  I  do  think  so.' 

'  Do  you  think  the  bas-reliefs  of  the  frieze,  representing  the  Pro- 
cession, also  in  the  first  class  of  the  art  ?' — '  In  the  first  class  of  the 
art.' 

'  Do  you  conceive  those  two  sets  to  be  of  or  about  the  same  date  ?' 
— '  I  cannot  determine  upon  that.' 

17 


258  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

1  Have  you  ever  looked  at  this  collection  with  a  view  to  the  value  of 
it  ?'_<  No,  I  have  not.5 

1  Can  you  form  any  sort  of  estimate  of  the  value  of  it  ?' — '  I  cannot 
say  anything  about  the  value.' 

'Do  you  think  it  very  desirable,  as  a  national  object,  that  this 
collection  should  become  public  property  ?' — '  Undoubtedly.' 

•  Can  you  form  any  judgment  as  to  the  date  of  those  works,  com- 
paring them  with  other  works  that  you  have  seen  in  Italy  ?' — 'I  sup- 
pose they  are  about  as  old  ;  but  they  may  be  older  or  later.' 

1  To  which  of  the  works  you  have  seen  in  Italy  do  you  think  the 
Theseus  bears  the  greatest  resemblance  ?' — '  I  compare  that  to  the 
Apollo  Belvidere  and  Laocoon.' 

'  Do  you  think  the  Theseus  of  as  fine  sculpture  as  the  Apollo  ?' — 
1 1  do.' 

1  Do  you  think  it  has  more  or  less  of  ideal  beauty  than  the  Apollo  ?' 
— '  I  cannot  say  it  has  more  than  the  Apollo.' 

'  Has  it  as  much  ?' — '  I  think  it  has  as  much.' 

*  Do  you  think  that  the  Theseus  is  a  closer  copy  of  fine  nature  than 
the  Apollo  ?' — '  No  ;  I  do  not  say  it  is  a  finer  copy  of  nature  than  the 
Apollo.' 

'  Is  there  not  a  distinction  among  artists  between  a  close  imitation 
of  nature  and  ideal  beauty  ?' — '  I  look  upon  them  as  ideal  beauty,  and 
closeness  of  study  from  nature.' 

'  You  were  asked  just  now  if  you  could  form  any  estimate  of  the 
value  of  this  collection  ;  can  you  put  any  value  upon  them,  compara- 
tively with  the  Townley  marbles  ?' — '  I  reckon  them  very  much  higher 
than  the  Townley  marbles  for  beauty.' 

'  Suppose  the  Townley  marbles  to  be  valued  at  £20,000,  what  might 
you  estimate  these  at  ?' — '  They  are  quite  a  different  thing  ;  I  think 
the  one  is  all  completely  finished  and  mended  up,  and  these  are  real 
fragments  as  they  have  been  found,  and  it  would  cost  a  great  deal  of 
time  and  expense  to  put  them  in  order.' 

Tor  the  use  of  artists,  will  they  not  answer  every  purpose  in 
their  present  state  ?'  —  '  Yes,  perfectly ;  I  would  not  have  them 
touched.' 

'  Have  you  seen  the  Greek  marbles  lately  brought  to  the  Museum  ?' 
— •  I  have.' 

1  How  do  you  rank  those  in  comparison  with  these  ?' — '  Those  are 
very  clever,  but  not  like  those  of  Lord  Elgin's.' 

'  Then  you  consider  them  very  inferior  ?' — '  No ;  I  consider  them 
inferior  to  Lord  Elgin's — not  very  inferior,  though  they  may  be  called 
inferior.' 

'  When  you  studied  in  Italy,  had  you  many  opportunities  of  seeing 


EVIDENCE  OF  FLAXMAN  259 

remains  of  Grecian  art  ?' — '  I  saw  all  the  fine  things  to  be  seen  at  Rome, 
both  in  painting  and  sculpture.' 

'  Do  you  remember  a  piece  of  bas-relief  representing  Bacchus  and 
Icarus,  in  the  Townley  collection  ?' — '  I  recollect  all  those  things  ;  I 
used  to  spend  my  Sundays  there  with  Mr.  Townley.' 

'  Do  you  happen  to  recollect  particularly  that  piece  ?' — '  No,  I  do  not 
recollect  it  among  the  great  quantity  of  things.' 

'  Have  you  formed  any  idea  of  the  value  of  these  objects  in  the 
light  of  acquisitions  to  individuals,  as  objects  of  decoration,  if  sold 
individually  ?; — '  I  cannot  put  a  value  upon  them ;  they  are  by  far  the 
finest  things  that  ever  came  to  this  country.' 

'  Do  you  mean  by  that  that  you  consider  them  so  valuable  that  you 
cannot  put  a  value  upon  them  ?' — '  No,  I  do  not  know  :  as  to  fine 
things,  they  are  not  to  be  got  every  day.7 

'  Do  you  consider  part  of  the  value  of  the  Townley  collection  to  have 
depended  upon  the  cost  and  labour  incurred  in  restoring  them  ?' — 'As 
for  restoring  them,  that  must  have  cost  a  great  deal  of  money ;  I  know 
Mr.  Townley  was  there  for  years  about  them.' 

'  Have  the  Elgin  collection  gained  in  general  estimation  and  utility 
since  they  have  been  more  known  and  studied?' — 'Yes.' 

John  Flaxman,  Esq.,  R.A.,  called  in,  and  examined. 

'Are  you  well  acquainted  with  the  Elgin  collection  of  marbles?' — 
'  Yes,  I  have  seen  them  frequently,  and  I  have  drawn  from  them  ;  and 
I  have  made  such  inquiries  as  I  thought  necessary  concerning  them 
respecting  my  art.' 

'  In  what  class  do  you  hold  them,  as  compared  with  the  first  works 
of  art  which  you  have  seen  before  ?' — '  The  Elgin  marbles  are  mostly 
basso-relievos,  and  the  finest  works  of  art  I  have  seen.  Those  in  the 
Pope's  Museum,  and  the  other  galleries  of  Italy,  were  the  Laocoon, 
the  Apollo  Belvidere  ;  and  the  other  most  celebrated  works  of  antiquity 
were  groups  and  statues.  These  differ  in  the  respect  that  they  are 
chiefly  basso-relievos  and  fragments  of  statuary.  With  respect  to  their 
excellence,  they  are  the  most  excellent  of  their  kind  that  I  have  seen  ; 
and  I  have  every  reason  to  believe  that  they  were  executed  by  Phidias, 
and  those  employed  under  him,  or  the  general  design  of  them  given  by 
him  at  the  time  the  temple  was  built ;  as  we  are  informed  that  he  was 
the  artist  principally  employed  by  Pericles,  and  his  principal  scholars, 
mentioned  by  Pliny,  Alcamenes,  and  about  four  others  immediately 
under  him  ;  to  which  he  adds  a  catalogue  of  seven  or  eight  others,  who 
followed  in  order ;  and  he  mentions  their  succeeding  Phidias  in  the 
course  of  twenty  years.  I  believe  they  are  the  works  of  those  artists  ; 
and  in  this  respect  they  are  superior  to  almost  any  works  of  antiquity, 


260  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

excepting  the  Laocoon  and  Torso  Farnese,  because  they  are  known  to 
have  been  executed  by  the  artists  whose  names  are  recorded  by  the 
ancient  authors.  With  respect  to  the  beauty  of  the  basso-relievos, 
they  are  as  perfect  nature  as  it  is  possible  to  put  into  the  compass  of 
the  marble  in  which  they  are  executed,  and  that  of  the  most  elegant 
kind.  There  is  one  statue,  also,  which  is  called  a  Hercules,  or  Theseus, 
of  the  first  order  of  merit.  The  fragments  are  finely  executed,  but  I 
do  not,  in  my  own  estimation,  think  their  merit  is  as  great.' 

'  What  fragments  do  you  speak  of  ?' — '  Several  fragments  of  women 
— the  groups  without  their  heads.5 

'You  do  not  mean  the  metopes?' — 'No;  those  statues  which  were 
in  the  east  and  west  pediments  originally.' 

'  In  what  estimation  do  vou  hold  the  Theseus,  as  compared  with  the 
Apollo  Belvidere  and  the  Laocoon  ?' — '  If  you  would  permit  me  to 
compare  it  with  a  fragment  I  will  mention,  I  should  estimate  it  before 
the  Torso  Belvidere.' 

'  As  compared  with  the  Apollo  Belvidere,  in  what  rank  do  you  hold 
the  Theseus  ?' — '  For  two  reasons  I  cannot  at  this  moment  very 
correctly  compare  them  in  my  own  mind.  In  the  first  place,  the 
Apollo  Belvidere  is  a  divinity  of  a  higher  order  than  Hercules,  and 
therefore  I  cannot  so  well  compare  the  two.  I  compared  the  Hercules 
with  a  Hercules  before,  to  make  the  comparison  more  just.  In  the 
next  place,  the  Theseus  is  not  only  on  the  surface  corroded  by  the 
weather,  but  the  head  is  in  that  impaired  state  that  I  can  scarcely  give 
an  opinion  upon  it,  and  the  limbs  are  mutilated.  To  answer  the 
question,  I  should  prefer  the  Apollo  Belvidere  certainly,  though  I 
believe  it  is  only  a  copy.' 

1  Does  the  Apollo  Belvidere  partake  more  of  ideal  beauty  than  the 
Theseus  ?' — '  In  my  mind,  it  does  decidedly  ;  I  have  not  the  least 
question  of  it.' 

'  Do  you  think  that  increases  its  value  ?' — '  Yes,  very  highly.  The 
highest  efforts  of  art  in  that  class  have  always  been  the  most  difficult 
to  succeed  in,  both  among  ancients  and  moderns,  if  they  have  suc- 
ceeded in  it/ 

1  Supposing  the  state  of  the  Theseus  to  be  perfect,  would  you  value 
it  more  as  a  work  of  art  than  the  Apollo  ?' — 'No  ;  I  should  value  the 
Apollo  for  the  ideal  beauty  before  any  male  statue  I  know.' 

*  Although  you  think  it  a  copy  ?' — '  I  am  sure  it  is  a  copy  ;  the  other 
is  an  original,  and  by  a  first-rate  artist.' 

1  The  Committee  is  very  anxious  to  know  the  reason  you  have  in 
stating  so  decidedly  your  opinion  that  the  Apollo  is  a  copy.' — '  There 
are  many  reasons,  and  I  am  afraid  it  would  be  troublesome  to  the  Com- 
mittee to  go  through  them.    The  general  appearance  of  the  hair  and  the 


EVIDENCE  OF  FLAXMAN  261 

mantle  of  the  Apollo  Belvidere  is  in  the  style  more  of  bronze  than  of 
marble  ;  and  there  is  mentioned  in  the  Pope's  Museum  (Pio  Clemen- 
tino)  by  the  Chevalier  Yisconti,  who  illustrated  that  museum,  that 
there  was  a  statue  in  Athens — I  do  not  know  whether  it  was  in  the 
city  or  some  particular  temple,  or  whether  the  place  is  mentioned — 
an  Apollo  Alexicacos,  a  driver  away  of  evil,  in  bronze,  by  Calamis, 
erected  on  account  of  a  plague  that  had  been  in  Athens.  From  the 
representations  of  this  statue  in  basso-relievos,  with  a  bow,  it  is 
believed  that  this  figure  might  be  a  copy  of  that.  One  reason  I  have 
given  is  that  the  execution  of  the  hair  and  cloak  resembles  bronze. 
But  another  thing  convinces  me  of  its  being  a  copy.  I  had  a  conver- 
sation with  Visconti  and  Canova  on  the  spot,  and  my  particular 
reason  is  this  :  a  cloak  hangs  over  the  left  arm,  which  in  bronze  it  was 
easy  to  execute,  so  that  the  folds  on  one  side  should  answer  to  the 
folds  on  the  other  ;  the  cloak  is  single,  and  therefore  it  is  requisite 
that  the  folds  on  one  side  should  answer  to  the  folds  on  the  other. 
There  is  no  duplication  of  drapery.  In  bronze  that  was  easy  to 
execute,  but  in  marble  it  was  not  ;  therefore,  I  presume,  the  copyist 
preferred  copying  the  folds  in  front ;  but  the  folds  did  not  answer  to 
each  other  on  one  side  and  the  other.  Those  on  the  back  appear  to 
have  been  calculated  for  strength  in  the  marble,  and  those  in  front  to 
represent  the  bronze,  from  which  I  apprehend  they  were  copied. 
There  is  another  reason,  which  is  that  the  most  celebrated  figure  of 
antiquity  is  mentioned  by  Pliny  and  its  sculptor,  the  Yenus  of  Cnidus 
by  Praxiteles  ;  and  he  mentions  it  in  a  remarkable  manner,  for  he 
says  the  works  of  Praxiteles  in  the  Ceramicus  not  only  excel  those  of 
all  other  sculptors,  but  his  own,  and  this  Yenus  excels  all  that  he  ever 
did.  Now,  it  seems  inconceivable  that  so  fine  a  statue  as  the  Apollo 
could  have  been  executed  without  its  name  being  brought  down  to  us 
either  by  Pliny  or  Pausanias,  if  it  had  been  esteemed  the  first  statue 
in  the  world.5  .  .  . 

'  Do  you  conceive  practically  that  any  improvement  has  taken  place 
in  the  state  of  the  arts  in  this  country  since  this  collection  has  been 
open  to  the  public  ?'—' Within  these  last  twenty  years,  I  think, 
sculpture  has  improved  in  a  very  great  degree,  and  I  believe  my 
opinion  is  not  singular  ;  but  unless  I  was  to  take  time  to  reflect  upon 
the  several  causes  of  which  that  has  been  the  consequence,  I  cannot 
pretend  to  answer  the  question.  I  think  works  of  such  prime  import- 
ance could  not  remain  in  the  country  without  improving  the  public 
taste  and  the  taste  of  the  artists.'  .  .  . 

'  What  characteristic  mark  do  you  observe  of  high  antiquity,  as 
compared  with  the  other  works  of  antiquity  ?' — '  In  the  first  place,  I 
observe  a  particular  classification  of  the  parts  of  the  body  ;  and  I  have 


262  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

adverted  to  the  medical  writer  of  that  age,  Hippocrates,  and  find  that 
the  distinctions  of  the  body,  when  they  have  been  taken  from  the 
finest  nature,  in  the  highest  state  of  exercise,  and  in  the  best  condition 
in  all  respects,  which  might  be  expected  from  those  who  possessed 
great  personal  beauty  and  cultivated  habits  of  living  most  likely  to 
produce  it,  and  who  were  accustomed  to  see  it  frequently  in  public 
exercises — this  classification,  which  they  appeared  to  prefer,  is  con- 
formable to  the  distinctions  in  the  statues.  It  is  well  known  that  in 
the  writings  of  Hippocrates  a  great  deal  of  attention  is  paid  to  the 
economy  of  the  human  body  and  its  interior  parts,  but  that  its 
exteriors  are  not  described  as  our  modern  anatomists  describe  them, 
but  in  a  simple  manner  by  a  general  classification  of  parts  and 
muscles.  What  I  would  particularly  say  on  the  subject  is  this: 
Hippocrates  describes  the  edges  of  the  ribs  as  forming  a  semicircle  at 
the  bottom  of  the  upper  thorax  ;  he  describes  with  some  accuracy  the 
meeting  and  form  of  the  upper  part  of  the  scapula  and  acromion  with 
the  collar-bone  (that  part  is  particularly  marked  in  these  figures) ;  he 
describes  the  knee-pan  as  a  single  bone  :  and  that  was  their  manner 
of  making  the  knee  in  the  statues  of  that  time  ;  and,  if  I  remember 
right,  he  also  describes  the  upper  part  of  the  basiu-bone,  which  is  par- 
ticularly marked  in  the  antique  statues.  In  a  few  words,  the  form  of 
the  body  has  a  classification  of  a  simple  kind  in  a  few  parts,  such  as  I 
find  in  the  ancient  anatomists,  and  such  as  are  common  in  the  outlines 
of  the  painted  Greek  vases.  Besides,  as  far  as  I  can  judge  from  our 
documents  of  antiquity — the  painted  Greek  vases,  for  example — those 
that  come  nearer  to  the  time  in  which  these  marbles  are  believed  to 
be  produced  are  conceived  in  the  same  character,  and  drawn  in  the 
same  manner.' 

'  Did  not  that  classification  continue  much  later  than  the  time  of 
Pericles  ?' — '  Yes,  it  did  continue  later,  but  it  became  more  compli- 
cated, and  in  some  cases  more  geometrical.' 

1  Does  the  anatomy  of  these  figures  agree  with  the  anatomy  of  the 
Laocoon  or  of  the  Torso  Farnese  ?' — '  They  agree  most  with  the  Torso 
Farnese.  I  cannot  judge  very  accurately  of  that  at  this  time,  for  it 
was  about  to  be  removed  from  Rome  at  the  time  I  was  there,  and  it 
is  very  much  broken.  In  respect  to  the  Laocoon,  I  believe  it  to  be  a 
very  posterior  work,  done  after  a  time  when  considerable  discoveries 
had  been  made  in  anatomy  in  the  Alexandrian  school,  which  I  think 
had  been  communicated  not  only  among  physicians,  but  among  artists 
all  over  Greece  ;  and  in  the  Laocoon  the  divisions  are  much  more 
numerous.' 

'  Do  you  observe  any  considerable  difference  in  the  conformation  of 
the  horses  between  the  metopes  and  the  Procession  ?' — '  It  is  to  be 


EVIDENCE  OF  FLAXMAN  263 

recollected,  both  in  the  metopes  and  the  Procession,  that  different 
hands  have  been  employed  upon  them  ;  so  that  it  is  difficult,  unless  I 
had  them  before  me,  to  give  a  distinct  opinion,  particularly  as  the 
horses  in  the  metopes  have  not  horses'  heads.  I  do  not  think  I  can 
give  a  very  decided  opinion  upon  it,  but  in  general  the  character 
appears  to  me  very  much  the  same.' 

1  Should  you  have  judged  the  metopes  and  the  frieze  to  be  of  the 
same  age  if  they  had  not  come  from  the  same  temple  ?' — '  Yes,  un- 
doubtedly I  should.' 

'  Have  you  ever  looked  at  this  collection  with  a  view  to  its  value  in 
money?' — 'I  never  have  ;  but  I  conceive  that  the  value  in  money 
must  be  very  considerable,  judging  only  from  the  quantity  of  sculpture 
in  it.  The  question  never  occurred  to  me  before  this  morning,  but  it 
appears  to  me  that  there  is  a  quantity  of  labour  equal  to  three  or  four 
of  the  greatest  public  monuments  that  have  lately  been  erected  ;  and 
I  think  it  is  said  either  in  Chandler's  "  Inscriptions  "  or  in  Stuart's 
"Athens"  that  the  temple  cost  a  sum  equal  to  £500,000.' 

'  Have  you  seen  the  Greek  marbles  lately  deposited  in  the  British 
Museum?— 'Yes.' 

1  In  what  class  do  you  place  those,  as  compared  with  the  basso- 
relievos  of  Lord  Elgin's  collection  ?' — '  With  respect  to  the  excellence 
of  workmanship,  the  metopes  and  the  basso-relievos  of  Procession  are 
very  superior  to  those  in  the  Museum,  though  the  composition  of  the 
others  is  exquisite.' 

1  Which  do  you  think  the  greatest  antiquity  ?' — '  Lord  Elgin's  ;  the 
others  I  take  to  be  nearly  twenty  years  later.1 

•  In  what  rate  do  you  class  these  marbles,  as  compared  with  Mr. 
Townley's  collection  ?' — '  I  should  value  them  more,  as  being  the 
ascertained  works  of  the  first  artists  of  that  celebrated  age.  The 
greater  part  of  Mr.  Townley's  marbles,  with  some  few  exceptions,  are 
perhaps  copies,  or  only  acknowledged  inferior  works.' 

'  Do  you  reckon  Lord  Elgin's  marbles  of  greater  value  as  never 
having  been  touched  by  any  modern  hand  ?' — '  Yes.' 

i  In  what  class  do  you  hold  the  draped  figures,  of  which  there  are 
large  fragments  ?' — '  They  are  fine  specimens  of  execution,  but  in 
other  respects  I  do  not  esteem  them  very  highly,  excepting  the  Iris 
and  a  fragment  of  the  Yictory.' 

'  Do  you  consider  those  to  be  of  the  same  antiquity  ? — '  I  do.' 

'  Be  pleased  to  account  for  the  difference  in  their  appearance.' — '  I 
think  sculpture  at  that  time  made  a  great  stride.  Phidias,  having  had 
the  advantage  of  studying  painting,  first  gave  a  great  freedom  to  his 
designs.  That  freedom  he  was  able  to  execute,  or  have  executed,  with 
great  ease  in  small  and  flat  works  ;  but  as  the  proportions  of  the 


264  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

particular  drawings  of  the  figures  were  not  so  well  understood  generally 
as  they  were  a  few  years  afterwards,  there  are  some  disproportions 
and  inaccuracies  in  the  larger  figures,  the  necessary  consequences  of 
executing  great  works  when  the  principles  of  an  art  are  not  estab- 
lished.' 

1  Do  you  recollect  two  figures  that  are  sitting  together  with  the  arms 
over  each  other  ?' — 'Yes.' 

*  Is  your  low  estimation  of  the  draped  figures  applicable  to  those  ?' 
— '  My  opinion  may  be  incorrect,  and  it  may  be  more  so  by  not  having 
the  figures  before  me ;  but  I  meant  my  observation  to  apply  to  all  the 
draped  figures.' 

'  Were  the  proportions  of  those  statues  calculated  to  have  their 
effect  at  a  particular  distance  ?' — '  I  believe  not ;  I  do  not  believe  the 
art  had  arrived  at  that  nicety.' 

•  You  have  remarked  probably  those  parts,  particularly  of  the 
Neptune  and  some  of  the  metopes,  that  are  in  high  perfection,  from 
having  been  preserved  from  the  weather  ?' — 'I  have  remarked  those 
that  are  in  the  best  condition.' 

'  Did  you  ever  see  any  statue  higher  finished  than  those  parts,  or 
that  could  convey  an  idea  of  high  finish  more  completely  to  an  artist  ?' 
— '  I  set  out  with  saying  that  the  execution  is  admirable.' 

'  In  those  particular  parts,  have  not  you  observed  as  high  a  finish  as 
in  any  statue  that  ever  you  saw  ?' — '  Yes  ;  and  in  some  places  a  very 
useless  finish,  in  my  opinion.' 

'  Do  you  think  the  Theseus  and  the  Neptune  of  equal  merit,  or  is 
one  superior  to  the  other  ?' — '  Chevalier  Canova,  when  I  conversed 
with  him  on  the  same  subject,  seemed  to  think  they  were  equal.  I 
think  the  Ilissus  is  very  inferior.' 

'  You  think  the  Ilissus  is  inferior  to  the  Theseus  ?' — '  Extremely 
inferior  ;  and  I  am  convinced,  if  I  had  had  an  opportunity  of  con- 
sidering it  with  Chevalier  Canova,  he  would  have  thought  so,  too.' 

'  Can  you  inform  the  Committee  whether  the  climate  of  England  is 
likely  to  have  a  different  effect  upon  the  statues  from  the  climate 
from  which  they  were  brought,  and  whether  it  would  be  possible,  by 
keeping  them  under  cover,  to  prevent  the  effect  of  the  climate  ?' — 
'  Entirely.' 

1  You  know  the  bas-relief  in  the  Townley  collection  of  Bacchus  and 
Icarus  ?' — '  Yes.5 

1  What  do  you  consider  the  workmanship  of  that,  comparatively 
with  any  of  Lord  Elgin's  bas-reliefs  ?' — '  Very  inferior.' 

Richard  Westmacott,  Esq.,  R.A.,  called  in,  and  examined. 
'Are  you  well  acquainted  with  the  Elgin  marbles  ?'— '  Yes.' 


EVIDENCE  OF  CHANTREY  AND  LAWRENCE        265 

'  In  what  class  of  art  do  you  rate  them  ?' — '  I  rate  them  of  the  first 
class  of  art.' 

'  In  what  rate  should  you  place  the  Theseus  and  the  River  God,  as 
compared  with  the  Apollo  Belvidere  and  Laocoon  ?' —  'Infinitely 
superior  to  the  Apollo  Belvidere.' 

1  Which  do  you  prefer — the  Theseus  or  the  River  God  ?' — '  They  are 
both  so  excellent  that  I  cannot  readily  determine.  I  should  say  the 
back  of  the  Theseus  was  the  finest  thing  in  the  world,  and  that  the 
anatomical  skill  displayed  in  front  of  the  Ilissus  is  not  surpassed  by 
any  work  of  art.' 

Francis  Chantrey,  Esq.,  called  in,  and  examined. 

'  Are  you  well  acquainted  with  the  Elgin  marbles  ?' — '  I  have 
frequently  visited  them.' 

'  In  what  class,  as  to  excellence  of  art,  do  you  place  them  ?' — '  Un- 
questionably in  the  first.' 

1  Have  you  ever  looked  at  this  collection  with  a  view  towards  its 
value  in  money  ?' — '  I  really  do  not  know  what  to  compare  them 
with.' 

'  Do  you  think  it  of  great  importance  to  the  art  of  sculpture  that 
this  collection  should  become  the  property  of  the  public?' — 'I  think 
it  of  the  greatest  importance  in  a  national  point  of  view.'  .  .  . 

Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,  Knt.,  R.A.,  called  in,  and  examined. 
'  Are  you  well  acquainted  with  the  Elgin  marbles  ?' — '  Yes,  I  am.' 
'  In  what  class  of  art  do  you  consider  them  ?' — '  In  the  very  highest.' 
?  In  your  own  particular  line  of  art,  do  you  consider  them  of  high 
importance  as  forming  a  national  school?' — '  In  a  line  of  art  which  I 
have  very  seldom  practised,  but  which  it  is  still  my  wish  to  do,  I 
consider  that  they  would,  namely,  historical  painting.' 

'  Do  you  conceive  any  of  them  to  be  of  a  higher  class  than  the 
Apollo  Belvidere  ?' — '  I  do  ;  because  I  consider  that  there  is  in  them 
a  union  of  fine  composition  and  very  grand  form,  with  a  more  true 
and  natural  expression  of  the  effect  of  action  upon  the  human  frame 
than  there  is  in  the  Apollo,  or  in  any  of  the  other  most  celebrated 
statues.' 

'You  have  stated  that  you  thought  these  marbles  had  great  truth 
and  imitation  of  nature  ;  do  you  consider  that  that  adds  to  their 
value  ?' — '  It  considerably  adds  to  it,  because  I  consider  them  as  united 
with  grand  form.  There  is  in  them  that  variety  that  is  produced  in 
the  human  form  by  the  alternate  action  and  repose  of  the  muscles 
that  strikes  one  particularly.  I  have  myself  a  very  good  collection  of 
the  best  casts  from  the  antique  statues,  and  was  struck  with  that 


266  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

difference  in  them  in  returning  from  the  Elgin  marbles  to  my  own 
house.' 

Questions  sent  to  the  President  of  the  Boyal  Academy,  his  health  not 
permitting  him  to  attend  the  Committee,  with  his  answers  thereto. 

'Are  you  well  acquainted  with  the  Elgin  collection?' — 'I  am, 
having  drawn  the  most  distinguished  of  them  the  size  of  the  original 
marbles.' 

*  In  what  class  of  art  do  you  rank  the  best  of  these  marbles  ?' — '  In 
the  first  of  dignified  art,  brought  out  of  nature  upon  uncertain  truths, 
and  not  on  mechanical  principles,  to  form  systematic  characters  and 
systematic  art.' 

'  Do  they  appear  to  you  the  work  of  the  same  artists  ?' — '  One  mind 
pervades  the  whole,  but  not  one  hand  has  executed  them.' 

'As  compared  with  the  Apollo  Belvidere,  the  torso  of  the  Bel- 
videre,  and  the  Laocoon,  how  do  you  estimate  the  Theseus  or 
Hercules,  and  the  Eiver  God  or  Ilissus  ?' — 'The  Apollo  of  the  Bel- 
videre, the  torso,  and  the  Laocoon  are  systematic  art  ;  the  Theseus 
and  the  Ilissus  stand  supreme  in  art.' 

'  Can  you  compare  in  money  value  Lord  Elgin's  marbles,  or  any  part 
of  them,  with  the  money  value  of  the  Phygalian  or  Townley  col- 
lection ?' — '  I  judge  of  the  Elgin  marbles  from  their  purity  and  pre- 
eminence in  art  over  all  others  I  have  ever  seen,  and  from  their  truth 
a  ad  intellectual  power ;  and  I  give  them  the  preference  to  the 
Phygalian  and  Townley  collection,  most  of  which  is  systematic  art.' 

The  generality  of  my  readers  will  be  pleased 
with  the  following  anecdote,  and  it  must  come 
home  to  every  good  rider  when  he  mounts  a  horse. 
Shortly  after  the  Elgin  marbles  wrere  thrown  open 
to  the  public  indiscriminately,  a  gentlemanly- 
looking  person  was  observed  to  stand  in  the  middle 
of  the  gallery  on  one  spot  for  upwards  of  an  hour, 
changing  his  attitude  only  by  turning  himself 
round  ;  at  last  he  left  the  room,  but  in  the  course 
of  two  hours  he  again  took  his  former  station, 
attended  by  about  a  dozen  young  gentlemen,  and 
there  to  them  he  made  nearly  the  following  obser- 
vations :   '  See,    gentlemen,    look    at    the  riders    all 


THE  RIDING-MASTER'S  CRITICISM  267 

round  the  room,'  alluding  to  the  friezes  ;  \  see  how 
they  sit  ;  see  with  what  ease  and  elegance  they 
ride  ;  I  never  saw  such  men  in  my  life  ;  they  have 
no  saddles,  no  stirrups — they  must  have  leaped 
upon  their  horses  in  a  grand  style.  You  will  do 
well  to  study  the  position  of  these  noble  fellows  ; 
stay  here  this  morning  instead  of  riding  with  me, 
and  I  am  sure  you  will  seat  yourselves  better  to- 
morrow.' I  need  hardly  tell  the  reader  that  this 
person  was  a  riding-master,  and  that  after  he  had 
been  so  astonished  at  the  sight  of  the  sculptor's 
riders,  he  brought  all  his  pupils  to  whom  he  was 
that  morning  to  have  given  lessons  in  his  riding- 
school. 

It  was  highly  amusing  to  notice  the  glaring 
contrast  of  the  two  sculptors,  Nollekens  and  Flax- 
man,  whenever  they  came  in  contact  in  a  fashion- 
able party,  which  I  own  was  rarely  the  case.  The 
former  upon  these  occasions,  who  was  never  known 
to  expatiate  upon  art,  generally  took  out  his  pocket- 
book,  and,  in  order  to  make  himself  agreeable,  pre- 
sented his  recipes,  perhaps  for  an  inveterate  sore 
throat  or  a  virulent  humour,  to  some  elegant  woman 
with  as  much  alacrity  as  Dr.  Bossy,  of  Covent 
Garden  fame,  formerly  did  to  the  wife  of  a  Fulham 
market-gardener. 

The  latter,  however,  like  a  true  descendant  of 
Phidias,  was  modestly  discoursing  with  a  select 
circle  upon  the  exquisite  productions  of  Greece,  at 
the  same  time  assuring  his  auditors  that  every 
motion  of  the  body  of  a  well-proportioned,  unaffected 
person  gave  sufficient  opportunities  for  the  selection 


268  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

of  similar  attitudes  o£  equal  grace  ;  that  he  con- 
sidered himself  frequently  indebted  to  the  simple 
and  unadorned  charity-girl  for  the  best  of  his 
attitudes,  and  that  these  he  had  often  collected 
during  his  walks  in  the  streets,  when  the  innocent 
objects  themselves  had  been  wholly  ignorant  of  his 
admiration  of  their  positions.  I  have  also  often 
heard  him  declare  that  the  most  successful  of  his 
figures  displayed  in  his  illustrations  of  Homer, 
yEschylus,  and  Dante  were  procured  from  similarly 
natural  and  unsophisticated  sources.  Flaxman,  like 
Rubens,  took  infinite  delight  in  his  collection  of 
Italian  medals,  the  best  of  which  he  fortunately 
procured  during  his  residence  at  Rome.  They  were 
mostly  of  the  fifteenth  century,  and  were  always 
estimated  by  him  as  the  richest  treasures  in  art 
that  he  possibly  could  possess  ;  and  perhaps  no 
man  of  his  refined  erudition  felt  or  expressed  greater 
pleasure  than  he  did  when  he  conversed  with  any 
person  possessed  of  sufficient  feeling  justly  to 
appreciate  their  superior  merit. 

Mr.  Samuel  Henning,1  a  young  artist  of  promising 
abilities  as  a  medallist,  asked  Flaxman's  permission 
to  take  an  impression  of  one  or  two  of  these  speci- 
mens ;  upon  which  the  sculptor,  with  his  usual 
urbanity,  not  only  instantly  complied,  but  allowed 
him  to  mould  a  selection  which  he  himself  kindly 
made  for  him,  and  which  he  considered  as  the  most 
interesting  and  beautiful  of  his  collection.     These 

1  This  should,  perhaps,  be  John  Henning,  the  Scotch  medallist 
(1771-1851),  who  produced  a  laborious  restoration  of  the  friezes  of  the 
Parthenon. — Ed. 


MEDALS  269 


consisted  of  Don  Inigo  de  Davalos,  the  face  of 
which  person  is  of  low  relief,  and  the  features  are 
expressive  of  a  man  of  great  depth  of  thought  and 
a  superior  mind ;  Benedictus  Depastis,  a  medal 
which  was  a  great  favourite  with  Flaxman,  though 
I  have  frequently  seen  him  laugh  at  the  collops  of 
fat  at  the  back  part  of  the  neck  ;  Leo  Baptista, 
Albertus,  Victorinus  Feltrensis  Summus,  Sigis- 
mondus  Pandulfus,  Cardinal  de  Malatestis,  Sancta^ 
Romame  Ecclesiae  Cardin.  Generalis,  the  hair  of 
which  head  differs  materially  from  the  preceding 
medals,  it  being  singularly  cut  in  a  precise  straight 
line  over  the  forehead. 

Few  persons  are  aware  of  the  superior  excel- 
lencies of  these  Italian  medals,  which  exceed  all 
others  in  point  of  natural  character,  the  beautiful 
productions  of  Thomas  Simon  excepted.  Many  of 
them  were  executed  under  the  glorious  auspices  of 
Leo  X.  after  the  designs  of  Michael  Angelo,  Cellini, 
Baffaelle,  Julio  Romano,  etc.,  and  possess  as  much 
fleshiness  as  Chantrey's  busts. 

Vasari,  in  his  valuable  work,  mentions  the  names 
of  the  following  medallists  who  flourished  in  his 
time,  viz.,  Miseldone,  Mathei  de  Pastis,  Sperandei, 
and  Villore  ;  and  we  find  that  Vittore  Pisano,  a 
painter  of  Verona,  was  highly  celebrated  as  the 
chief  restorer  of  this  branch  of  art ;  his  medals,  as 
well  as  those  of  his  contemporaries,  were  first 
modelled  in  wax,  and  then  cast ;  and  a  catalogue 
of  his  medallic  productions  is  given  by  Vasari.  In 
the  British  Museum  there  is  a  brass  medal  of 
Pisano,  executed  by  himself,  which  is  considered  as 


270  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

a  rarity  by  collectors,  it  being  one  of  those  which 
were  carefully  worked  up  with  the  tool  after  they 
were  cast.  It  displays  rather  a  reserved  set  of 
features,  short  and  close  together,  the  nose  of  which 
inclines  to  that  character  commonly  called  the  snub. 
His  cap,  which  is  an  upright  one  with  many  folds, 
reminded  me  of  that  sort  usually  worn  when  I 
was  a  boy  by  the  old  glass-grinders  of  the  Seven 
Dials. 

I  also  remember  seeing  Smollett's  man  Strap, 
when  he  was  a  bookbinder,  living  near  Chelsea  Old 
Church,  in  a  similar  one  ;  he  was  afterwards,  for 
several  years  before  his  death,  keeper  of  the  lodge 
of  Buckingham  Terrace,  Strand,  near  Inigo  Jones's 
water-gate,  a  truly  correct  engraving  of  which  is 
given  in  Campbell's  Vitruvius.  In  my  opinion, 
the  productions  of  Pisano1  are  by  far  the  most 
spirited,  as  must  unquestionably  be  the  case  when- 
ever a  painter  executes  a  beloved  task  with  his  own 
hand.  The  medals  by  him  are  equal  to  pictures,  as 
they  display  a  fine  breadth  and  a  true  character  of 
nature,  excellencies  which  a  mere  mechanical  and 
perpetual  copyist  can  never  arrive  at.  How  far 
more  refreshing  it  is  to  a  person  possessing  a 
moderate  share  of  discernment  to  see  an  etching 
by  Vandyke,  with  all  its  foul  bitings,  where  the 
markings  are  firm  and  square,  than  an  engraving  by 
Vosterman    or  Bolswert,    where   every  delineation 

1  I  do  not  find  Pisano  mentioned  in  any  of  the  dictionaries  of 
painters,  though  I  concluded  Fuseli  would  have  noticed  him. — Smith. 
Vittorio  Pisano,  called  Pisanello,  of  Verona  (1380-1456),  the  earliest 
and  most  illustrious  of  the  medallists  of  the  Italian  Renaissance. — Ed. 


THE  MEDALS  OF  SIMON  271 

is  rounded  comparatively  to  a  dull,  inanimate 
smoothness  !  How  delighted,  too,  is  the  eye  of 
taste  with  an  old  impression  from  the  uncon- 
taminated  needles  of  Claude,  Swaneveldt,  Karel 
Du  Jardin,  or  Eembrandt  !  How  the  fretful,  weak, 
and  laboured  engravings  by  French  artists  in  the 
Poullein,  the  Praslin,  and  the  Choiseul  collections 
sink  under  the  comparison  when  opposed  to  such 
treasures,  delivered  at  once  from  the  painter's  mind 
and  by  his  own  hand  ! 

So  likewise  it  is  with  the  works  of  Simon,  our 
own  countryman,  engraved  during  the  Usurpation  ; 
that  artist  drew  well,  and  his  reliefs,  which  are  low 
and  broad,  appear  more  like  a  fine  chiaro-oscuro 
painting  than  sculptured  productions.  His  manner 
of  treating  the  hair  is  beautiful,  and  perhaps  superior 
to  that  of  every  other  medallist  ;  and  nothing  can 
surpass  in  that  particular  the  specimens  of  his 
talents  displayed  in  the  head  of  Cromwell  on  the 
largest  of  the  two  Dunbar  medals,  and  also  that  of 
Thomas  Wriothesley,  Earl  of  Southampton.  This 
silver  medal,  which  exhibits  the  Earl  in  a  cap,  is 
considered  one  of  great  rarity  ;  but  the  one  in 
gold,  which  was  purchased  of  Mr.  Young  by  the 
late  Barry  Roberts,  Esq.,  for  the  sum  of  twenty 
guineas,  now  in  the  British  Museum,  is  looked  upon 
as  unique,  not  only  on  account  of  its  being  the  only 
one  known  in  that  metal,  but  also  from  its  variation 
from  those  in  silver,  the  cap  having  been  cut  down 
so  as  to  exhibit  the  hair  without  one,  which  the 
artist  has  managed  in  a  most  tasteful  manner.  In 
the  gold  impression  l  Tho.  Simon  '  is  cut  under  the 


272  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

projection  of  the  shoulder,  which  is  not  the  case 
with  those  in  silver.  Of  this  medal  with  the  cap 
there  is  also  a  bad  copy,  an  impression  of  which 
may  also  be  seen  in  the  British  Museum.  It  is  a 
curious  fact  that,  upon  comparing  the  above  medal 
with  the  circular  one  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  inscribed 
c  Oliverus.  Dei.  Gra :  Keipub :  Anglla.  Sco.  Et. 
Hib :  &c.  Protector.  Tho.  Simon  F.,'  the  lower  parts 
of  the  faces  are  so  like  each  other  that  they  would 
answer  for  either  person. 

I  am  well  aware  that  there  are  numerous  col- 
lectors who  prefer  dies  engraven  in  France,  and 
particularly  the  medallions  and  medals  struck  in 
favour  of  Napoleon,  many  of  which  unquestionably 
possess  great  merit,  and  are  worthy  of  high  ad- 
miration ;  but,  in  my  opinion,  none  of  them  are 
equal  in  mind  to  those  of  Italy,  produced  under 
Leo  X.,  nor  do  they  in  more  than  one  instance  in 
point  of  taste  approach  the  productions  of  our  own 
countryman,  Thomas  Simon. 

The  one  I  allude  to  is  that  which  was  struck  of 
Buonaparte  to  commemorate  the  famous  battle  of 
Marengo.  In  the  first  state  of  the  die  I  certainly 
esteem  this  medal  as  the  most  beautiful  performance 
of  Andrieu.  I  was  not  aware  of  the  superior  ex- 
cellence of  this  medal  in  its  first  stage  of  publica- 
tion, until  an  old  and  worthy  friend  put  me  in 
possession  of  impressions  in  two  states,  in  which 
the  head  differs  widely,  and  which  is,  I  believe,  the 
only  portion  of  that  medal  wherein  an  alteration 
has  been  made.  At  the  time  that  the  battle  was 
fought   Buonaparte    was  a   thin    man,    and   conse- 


NAPOLEON  I.  273 


quently  the  extraordinary  markings  of  his  features 
were  particularly  visible,  and,  I  conclude,  accurately 
attended  to  by  the  medallist.  For  instance,  the 
eye,  by  not  being  surrounded  by  much  flesh,  is 
keen  and  penetrating,  the  nose  and  lips  are  thin, 
and,  indeed,  the  whole  of  his  countenance  appears 
steadfastly  determined  upon  prosecuting  his  inten- 
tions. In  the  second  state  of  this  medal  the  head 
and  neck  are  so  considerably  enlarged  that  every 
feature  is  rounded  by  an  increase  of  flesh  as  well 
as  of  years.  In  this  state  of  corpulence  Napoleon's 
medals  were  more  generally  collected  by  his 
adherents,  as  well  as  by  those  who  had  cabinets 
for  the  reception  of  such  works  of  art  ;  and  it  is 
supposed  that  Andrieu,  in  order  that  this  Marengo 
medal  of  Buonaparte  should  be  more  like  him  when 
Emperor  Napoleon,  altered  the  head  as  we  find  it 
in  its  second  state.  He  unfortunately,  however, 
suffered  the  name  of  Buonaparte  to  remain,  never 
caring  for  the  periodical  truth  of  physiognomy  ; 
and  a  distance  of  a  few  years  made  no  difference  to 
him.  If  an  Englishman  had  been  guilty  of  such  a 
violation  of  truth,  what  would  have  been  said  of 
him  ?  and  this  is  a  more  glaring  instance  of 
anachronism,  as  Andrieu  has  placed  the  counte- 
nance of  his  experienced  and  fattened  hero  upon 
his  youthful  shoulders,  before  he  had  been  bloated 
by  successful  ambition  or  had  gone  through  half 
his  depredations. 

Mr.  Nollekens,  during  his  residence  abroad,  accu- 
mulated numerous  coins,  mostly  the  currency  of 
the  countries  which  he  passed  through,  not  with  a 

18 


274  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

view  to  their  increasing  in  value,  or  for  their  parti- 
cular merit,  but  with  the  usual  idea  of  a  miser  who 
is  fearful  of  a  change  in  affairs,  or  what  is  more 
commonly  called  a  revolution  in  the  country,  and 
who  fully  relies  upon  the  intrinsic  value  of  gold  and 
silver.  He  probably  never  dreamed  of  the  great 
loss  sustained  by  hoarding  up  foreign  money,  which 
seldom  produces  more  than  its  weight.  Had  he 
sold  his  coins,  and  put  the  amount  out  to  interest, 
he  would  have  increased  the  principal  in  the  course 
of  sixty  years  to  at  least  ten  times  its  original  value, 
and  thereby  have  saved  himself  many  years'  vexa- 
tion for  the  loss  of  all,  which  he  actually  suffered  in 
consequence  of  thieves  breaking  into  his  house  and 
stealing  all  those  pieces  of  gold  and  silver,  together 
with  Mr.  Welch's  silver  cruet-stand,  and  other 
articles  to  a  considerable  amount. 

The  depredators,  having  entered  the  house  at  the 
back-window  on  the  staircase,  went  at  once  to  the 
place  where  the  above  articles  were  deposited,  in 
the  very  next  room  to  that  in  which  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Nollekens  were  asleep,  and  let  themselves  out  at 
the  street-door,  without  any  one  of  the  family  being 
aware  of  their  visit  till  the  next  morning.  The 
window  was  then  discovered  to  be  open,  and  the 
ladder  by  which  they  had  ascended  from  the  yard 
left  to  show  the  way  by  which  they  had  gained 
admittance.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that,  in  a  dirty 
book  which  they  had  dropped  on  their  way  out, 
bank-notes  were  found  to  a  considerable  amount  by 
the  person  who  restored  them  to  Mr.  Nollekens, 
who,  whenever  this  robbery  was  mentioned,  which 


GEMS  275 

there  was  every  reason  to  believe  had  been  com- 
mitted by  persons  connected  with  one  of  the 
numerous  women  who  stood  for  his  Venuses,  ob- 
served that  '  the  rascals  took  away  all  my  gold  and 
silver  coins,  and  left  me  all  the  copper  ones.'  These 
midnight  moneyers  also  carried  off  to  their  melting- 
pot,  after  throwing  away  the  rags  in  which  they 
were  folded,  a  few  English  silver  medals  of  little 
value  beyond  their  metallic  gravity  ;  fortunately, 
there  were  no  brass  sand- moulded  Pisanos  in  danger 
in  Mortimer  Street,  such  treasures  being  securely 
deposited  in  the  choice  cabinets  of  Flaxman. 

Mr.  Nollekens  now  and  then  amused  himself  and 
a  friend  or  two  with  his  prints,  but  seldom  spoke 
of  the  beauties  of  ancient  bronzes  ;  and  as  for  ex- 
patiating upon  the  boldness  and  vigour  of  a  Roman 
medal,  that  with  him  was  quite  out  of  the  question. 
It  is  true  that  he  had  a  collection  of  gems,  impres- 
sions mostly  taken  from  the  antique,  though  cer- 
tainly made  with  very  little  discrimination  as  to 
their  superior  excellence  in  point  of  art  in  com- 
parison with  those  by  his  contemporaries  Birch, 
Merchant,  and  Tassie  ;  for  he  would  be  as  highly 
pleased  with  an  inferior  imitation  of  an  antique  as 
with  an  original  of  the  choicest  excellence.  In 
placing  the  various  subjects  in  boxes,  he  never 
attended  to  any  kind  of  classification  whatever, 
since  it  was  the  same  thins:  to  him  whether  thev 
were  sacred  or  profane,  and  a  figure  of  Eve  or  a 
Susannah  was  placed  with  that  of  a  Lucretia  or  a 
Leda.  His  heads,  though  they  were  certainly  kept 
by  themselves,  could  boast  of  no  better  arrange- 


276  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

ment,  as  that  of  Hannibal  was  placed  next  to  one  of 
Flora.  This  mode  of  jumbling  of  eminent  char- 
acters together  reminded  me  of  Lingo,  the  school- 
master, who,  in  '  The  Agreeable  Surprise,'1  asks 
Cowslip,  the  dairymaid,  if  she  had  ever  heard  of 
Homer,  Hercules,  or  Wat  Tyler. 

His  assemblage  of  plaster-casts  from  the  antique 
had  experienced  very  little  augmentation  since  his 
departure  from  Rome,  where  he  had  purchased 
most  of  them  at  a  trifling  rate  from  the  boys  of 
Lucca,  who  at  that  time  exhibited  them  for  sale  at 
fairs.  His  studio  certainly  could  not  boast  of  a 
vestibule  of  statues  as  large  as  life — a  most  gratify- 
ing sight  to  the  sculptor's  visitors  so  beautifully 
displayed  in  the  galleries  of  Chan  trey  and  Westma- 
cott — but,  on  the  contrary,  Nollekens'  walls  were 
principally  covered  with  heads,  arms,  legs,  hands, 
and  feet,  moulded  from  some  of  the  most  celebrated 
specimens  abroad,  together  with  a  few  casts  of  bas- 
reliefs  of  figures,  and  here  and  there  a  piece  of  foliage 
from  the  Vatican,  all  of  which  were  hung  up  with- 
out the  least  reference  whatever  to  each  other. 

Nollekens  paid  but  little  attention  to  the  pro- 
ductions of  the  ancients,  though,  indeed,  I  have 
seen  him  finish  up  the  feet  of  his  female  figures 
from  those  of  the  statue  of  the  Venus  de  Medicis, 
the  English  women,  his  constant  models,  having 
very  bad  toes  in  consequence  of  their  abominable 
habit   of  wearing   small  and   pointed  shoes.      My 

1  '  The  Agreeable  Surprise '  was  a  musical  farce,  by  John  O'Keefe,. 
brought  out  at  The  Haymarket  in  1781.  It  was  long  a  great  favourite 
with  the  public. — Ed. 


ARTISTIC  HEREDITY  277 


worthy  friend,  Joseph  Bonomi,  was  sure  to  incur 
his  displeasure  whenever  he  discovered  him  study- 
ing the  antique,  and  Nollekens  would  often  chide 
him  for  not  trusting  more  to  Nature.  I  am,  how- 
ever, perfectly  convinced  that  if  Nollekens  had 
looked  with  more  love  towards  the  antique  his 
Venuses  would  have  been  considerably  benefited, 
particularly  in  their  ankles,  which  in  many  instances 
are  too  thick,  and  certainly  remind  me  of  Fuseli's 
observation,  that  '  they  were  Goltzius'  legs.' 

We  seldom  find  hereditary  succession  in  art,  nor 
can  I  recollect  a  single  instance  in  which  the  son  of 
an  eminent  painter  or  sculptor  has  equalled  the 
talent  of  his  father  ;  neither  have  I  been  able  to 
discover  in  the  works  of  any  pupil  merit  equal  to 
that  of  his  great  master  ;  and  I  believe  that  it  will 
be  found  that  the  artists  of  the  highest  genius  have 
sprung  from  the  lowest  schools,  or  have  arisen  to 
the  pinnacle  of  fame  by  their  own  strength  of  mind 
and  persevering  application. 

I  do  not  mean  here  to  insert  an  extended  list  of 
the  bright  living  instances  of  a  Lawrence,  or  a 
Wilkie,  a  Chantrey,  a  Westmacott,  a  Turner,  a 
Stothard,  a  Collins,  etc.,  in  support  of  my  position, 
but  shall  principally  confine  my  assertion  to  other 
eminent  men  who  have  already  quitted  this  world, 
commencing  with  some  of  foreign  countries  and 
concluding  with  those  of  England.  Michael  Angelo, 
during  the  time  he  was  with  his  master  Domenico, 
corrected  one  of  that  artist's  drawings  to  the  astonish- 
ment of  all  the  schools.  The  sublime  Raffaelle 
soon   excelled   his   master,  Pietro    Perugino  ;    and 


278  NOLLEKEKS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Antonio  Correggio  owed  all  his  wonderful  powers 
to  Nature,  his  master,  Francesco  Bianchi,  being  but 
of  slender  talent.  The  instructor  of  the  inimitable 
Claude  Lorraine,  Agostino  Tassi,  merely  taught 
him  the  method  of  preparing  his  colours  ;  whilst 
Claude's  famous  contemporary,  Nicolo  Poussin,  had 
for  his  master  Ferdinand  Elle  and  L'Allement,  who 
were  both  men  of  feeble  abilities.  How  much  did 
Rubens  surpass  his  preceptors,  Tobias  Yerhaccht, 
Adam  Van  Oort,  and  Octavio  Van  Veen  !  How 
wonderfully  did  Rembrandt  exceed  his  tutors, 
Zwanenburg,  Lastman,  and  Pinas  !  Albert  Cuyp's 
pictures  eminently  stand  before  those  of  his  father ; 
and  how  far  superior  are  the  pictures  of  our  own 
Dobson  to  the  productions  of  the  English  artists 
who  preceded  him,  for  his  master  was  nothing  more 
than  a  stationer  and  a  picture -dealer  !  The  im- 
mortal Hogarth  was  the  apprentice  of  Ellis  Gamble, 
a  silversmith,  who  employed  him  to  engrave  arms 
and  shop-bills  ;  and  that  exquisite  landscape-painter, 
Richard  Wilson,  courted  Nature  alone,  under  every 
variety  of  aerial  tint,  and  his  finest  pictures  display 
all  her  sparkling  sunny  freshness  after  a  summer 
shower. 

Gainsborough  was  another  of  Nature's  pupils  ; 
and  it  might  be  said  of  him,  as  it  has  been  said  of 
Shakespeare,  that  he  '  warbled  his  native  wood- 
notes  wild.'  The  portraits  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds' 
master,  Thomas  Hudson,  would  hardly  be  admitted 
into  our  present  minor  exhibitions  ;  and  the  pictures 
painted  by  the  instructor  of  the  late  venerable  Pre- 
sident West,  Raffaelle  Mengs,  sink  exceedingly  low 


ENGRA  VERS  279 


when  they  are  mentioned  with  the  works  of  his 
pupil.  It  will  also  be  recollected  that  Zoffany  was 
originally  only  a  decorator  of  clock-dials. 

Our  three  most  eminent  engravers,  too,  have 
never  been  equalled  in  any  part  of  the  globe, 
though  William  Woollett's  master,  Tinney,1  was  so 
insignificant  an  artist  that  Strutt,  in  his  '  Bio- 
graphical Dictionary,'  has  not  thought  proper  to 
give  the  least  account  of  him  ;  Sir  Robert  Strange's 
tutor  was  Cooper,2  an  obscure  engraver  in  Scotland  ; 
and  William  Sharp,3  who  has  immortalized  himself 
in  his  production  from  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds'  portrait 
of  John  Hunter,  was  originally  an  engraver  of 
the  letters  upon  pewter-pots,  dog-collars,  door-plates, 
visiting-cards,  etc.,  and  he  assured  me  that  the  only 
difference  he  ever  had  with  William  Byrne,4  the 
landscape-engraver,  was  respecting  the  quantity  of 
door-plates  they  had  engraved,  Sharp  insisting  upon 
his  claim  to  the  greatest  number  by  some  hundreds. 

1  John  Tinney,  a  mezzotint  engraver,  died  in  Paris  in  1761. — Ed. 

2  Cooper  was  the  father  of  Kichard,  the  drawing-master,  who  lately- 
died  at  Eltham.  The  errors  into  which  Mr.  Strutt  has  fallen  respecting 
the  two  Coopers  will,  I  doubt  not,  be  entirely  rectified  by  Mr.  Ottley 
in  his  '  Dictionary  of  Engravers,'  a  work  which,  in  the  expectation  of 
everyone  who  is  acquainted  with  that  gentleman's  great  accuracy  and 
most  extensive  knowledge  of  the  subject,  will  supersede  all  others 
hitherto  published.  —  Smith.  This  elder  Cooper  was  also  Richard. 
He  died  in  1764,  and  was  both  engraver  and  portrait-painter. — Ed. 

3  Born  in  1749,  died  1824.  He  was  one  of  the  ardent  supporters  of 
Joanna  Southcott. — Ed. 

4  1743-1805.— Ed. 


[s8o] 


CHAPTEE  XII. 

Mrs.  Nollekens'  new  drawing-room — Caleb  Whitefoord's  attentions 
to  Nollekens — Cross-readings — Goldsmith's  '  Retaliation  ' — White- 
foord's letter  to  his  nephew — Mrs.  Nollekens,  her  servant,  and  her 
acquaintances  —  Her  death  and  funeral  —  Subsequent  conduct  of 
Mr.  Nollekens — Mrs.  Lloyd  and  Mrs.  Paradice — A  Garrick  play-bill 
— Mrs.  Lloyd's  will — Her  death — Eccentricities  of  Mr.  Nollekens — 
Mr.  Barnard's  Italian  drawings — Jernigan's  lottery  medal — Nollekens 
and  his  sitters — George  III.'s  wig — The  sculptor's  family — Bat 
Pidgeon's  shop. 

Upon  the  demise  of  Miss  Welch,1  Mrs.  Nollekens, 
her  sister,  who  had  been  most  grievously  dis- 
appointed in  the  bequest  of  her  household  furniture, 
to  the  great  astonishment  of  her  friends,  and  par- 
ticularly of  her  husband,  purchased  articles  per- 
fectly new  in  order  to  improve  her  drawing-room, 
which  had  remained  for  years  as  it  was  originally 
fitted  up,  increasing  in  nothing  but  dirt.  So  great 
was  the  change  for  the  better,  that  for  some  time 
she  only  allowed  her  friends  to  take  a  peep  in  at 
the  door  now  and  then,  while  she  held  it  what  is 
often   called   ajar.     Nor   could   she  think  of  per- 

1  The  late  Mrs.  Lloyd,  R.A.,  informed  Mrs.  Nichols,  her  confidential 
domestic,  that  Miss  Welch,  after  her  father's  death,  whilst  she  was 
abroad,  frequently  travelled  as  a  man,  with  sword  and  bag,  attended 
by  a  man-servant  only. — Smith. 


CALEB  WHITEFOORD  281 

mitting  even  her  set  visitors  to  stay  the  evening  in 
that  room,  as  the  stupid  servant  had  forgotten  to 
light  a  fire  in  it  ;  so  that,  after  they  had  been 
shown  up,  they  were  unavoidably  obliged  to  be 
entertained — if  it  might  be  allowed  that  her  parties 
were  ever  entertained — in  the  parlour  with  Nolly, 
where  there  had  been  a  comfortable  fire  constantly 
kept  up  during  the  whole  of  the  inclement  season. 

In  the  summer,  in  order  to  let  in  a  little  fresh 
air,  the  sashes  were  thrown  up,  either  to  enable  her 
to  appear  blowing  the  chaff  from  her  canary  bird's 
trough,  or  watering  a  delicate  sprig  or  two  of 
myrtle,  which  had  been  kindly  presented  to  her 
by  Mr.  Whitefoord,  whose  sharp  little  eyes  had 
been  for  some  years  so  closely  fixed  upon  No.  9, 
Mortimer  Street  that  he  never  suffered  a  week  to 
pass  without  inviting  them  by  some  small  present 
to  recollect  his  kind  remembrance  of  them,  and  by 
way  of  a  pretty  good  instance  of  his  tender  anxiety 
for  the  continuance  of  his  dear  Nolly's  health.  By 
way  of  proving  my  assertion,  I  here  insert  a  copy 
of  an  endearing  epistle  shown  to  me  by  Nollekens. 
This  c  wine  merchant '  and  excellent  connoisseur  in 
old  pictures  had  more  prudence  in  sending  his 
presents  to  a  man  enormously  rich  than  to  a 
fellow- creature  whose  frame  was  shivering  for  the 
want  of  a  trifle  to  procure  him  a  basin  of  broth  and 
a  night's  lodging  : 

•Dear  Nolly, 

'  Here  is  a  fleecy  hosiery  shirt  for  you — put  it  on  immediately, 
and  also  the  breastplate.  They  will  keep  you  warm  and  comfortable 
during  the  cold  weather— keep  you  free  from  rheumatism,  and  pro- 
long your  life. 


282  .  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

4 1  intended  to  have  delivered  this  myself,  but  I  have  not  been  out 
to-day. 

'  Yours  sincerely, 

4  C.  Whitefoord. 
4  "Wednesday  evening.' 

At  this  time  Caleb  was  so  constant  a  guardian  of 
Nollekens'  knocker,  that  no  one  ventured  to  cope 
with  his  wit  on  that  sculptor's  threshold,  for,  like 
Goldsmith's  goose,1  he  stoutly  kept  up  his  right  to 
the  pond's  side. 

4  The  pond,'  she  said,  '  was  hers,  and  she  would 
maintain  her  right  in  it  and  support  her  honour, 
while  she  had  a  bill  to  hiss  or  a  wing  to  flutter. 
In  this  manner  she  drove  away  ducks,  pigs,  and 
chickens — nay,  even  the  insidious  cat  was  seen  to 
scamper.' 

Advanced  on  the  journey  of  life  as  Nollekens 
was,  little  did  this  '  cross-reader  '  imagine  that  the 
road  he  was  treading  was  straiter  for  him,  and  that 
an  earlier  period  was  fixed  for  his  own  departure 
from  what  most  persons  are  scrambling  for — the 
good  things  of  this  life,  as  they  are  called  by  the 
worldly  traveller.  Whitefoord  left  us,  and  by  his 
death,  though  Nollekens  lost  his  primest  of  wits, 
his  high  reputation  as  a  stockholder  gained  him  a 
host  of  flatterers,  for  he  was  immediately  and 
constantly  assailed  by  foxes  from  all  quarters  ;  and 
one  considered  himself  sure  of  the  prey,  by  inviting 
him  to  take  a  peep  at  a  jackdaw  which  perched 
every  morning  upon  a  pretty  almond-tree  in  full 
blossom,  near  to  which  he  himself  lay,  at  a  short 
distance  from  the  Metropolis. 

1  See  Goldsmith's  *  Essay  on  the  Irresolution  of  Youth.'— Smith. 


THE  GARRICK  WIG  283 


Whitef  oord,  who  never  ventured  abroad  but  with 
a  full  determination  to  be  noticed,  dressed  himself 
foppishly,  particularly  so  in  some  instances.  It  is 
true  he  did  not  upon  trivial  occasions  sport  the 
strawberry  embroidery  of  Cos  way,  yet  he  was 
considered  extravagantly  dashing  in  a  sparkling 
black  button,  which  for  many  years  he  continued 
to  display  within  a  loop  upon  a  rosette  on  his  three- 
cornered  hat,  which  he  was  sure  to  take  off  when- 
ever he  considered  bowing  politically  essential. 
The  wig  worn  by  him  for  years  when  he  was  at  the 
summit  of  notoriety  had  five  curls  on  each  side, 
and  he  was  one  of  the  last  gentlemen  who  wore  the 
true  Garrick  cut.1 

So  delighted  was  Mr.  Whitefoord  with  his 
celebrated  '  cross-readings,'  that  he  liberally  dis- 
tributed among  his  friends  specimens  of  some  of  the 
most  whimsical,  which  he  had  been  at  the  expense 
of  printing  upon  small  single  sheets.  As  one  of 
these  trifles,  which  are  now  considered  rarities,  was 
preserved  by  my  father,  I  am  enabled  to  treat  the 
reader  with  a  few  specimens,  which  may  be  con- 
sidered, by  those  who  are  not  fond  of  long  digres- 
sions, quite  enough : 


4  Yesterday  Dr.  Pretymari  preached  at  St.  James's — 
And  perform'd  it  with  ease  in  less  than  sixteen  minutes.' 

1  The  sword  of  state  was  carried — 
Before  Sir  John  Fielding,  and  committed  to  Newgate.' 

1  This  peculiar  wig,  with  five  curls  on  each  side,  was  brought  into 
fashion  by  David  Garrick,  and  its  cut  is  precisely  engraven  by 
Sherwin  in  his  portrait  of  the  actor  done  for  Davies'  Memoirs. — 
Smith. 


284  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 

'  Several  changes  are  talked  of  at  Court — 
Consisting  of  9,050  triple  bob-majors.' 

'  Removed  to  Marylebone,  for  the  benefit  of  the  air — 
The  City  and  Liberties  of  Westminster.' 

'  We  hear  a  treaty  of  marriage  is  concluded — 
For  £50  a  side,  between  the  noted  Dyer  and  the  famous  Naylor.' 

1  Sunday  night  many  noble  families  were  alarmed — 
By  the  constable  of  the  watch,  who  apprehended  them  at  cards.' 

An  assertion  has  been  credited  by  many  persons 
that  Goldsmith  was  not  the  author  of  the  postscript 
now  printed  with  his  poem  entitled  '  Retaliation,' 
but  that  it  was  written  by  Caleb  Whitefoord,  whom 
it  celebrates,  and  w^ho  now  and  then  endeavoured 
to  imitate  his  manner.  It  may  be  true  that  the 
lines  were  conveyed  to  the  editor  of  the  fifth 
edition1  by  one  of  their  mutual  friends,  and  that 
they  were  not  produced  before  the  Doctor's  death  ; 
but  certainly  the  length  of  praise  bestowed  upon 
Whitefoord  in  the  postscript  has  been  considered 
unconscionably  long  as  wrell  as  uncommonly  great, 
especially  for  a  man  whose  qualifications  could 
never  rank  him  with  Burke  or  Reynolds.  The 
author  of  l  Retaliation,'  however,  thought  proper 
to  confine  his  praise  of  those  immortal  men  to  a 
considerably  less  number  than  eighteen  lines. 

The   late  Charles   Smith,2  painter  to  the  Great 

1  This  edition  is  of  1774.  The  additional  lines  were  accompanied 
by  an  anonymous  letter,  purporting  to  authenticate  them.  Curiously 
enough,  although  Whitefoord  lived  on  till  1810,  no  further  light  was 
ever  thrown  on  the  subject,  and  in  all  probability  he  forged  both  lines 
and  letter. — Ed. 

a  Born  in  1749,  he  went  to  India  in  1793,  returned  three  years 
later,  and  died  in  1824. — Ed. 


CALEB  WHITEFOORD  285 


Mogul,  favoured  me,  through  my  worthy  friend, 
Thomas  Gilliland,  Esq.,  author  of  the  celebrated 
pamphlet  of  l  Diamond  cut  Diamond,'  and,  I  believe, 
about  sixteen  or  seventeen  others  in  defence  and 
support  of  the  English  Government,  with  a  letter 
which  he  received  from  his  uncle,  Caleb  White- 
f  oord,  who  was  particularly  anxious  to  witness  his 
nephew's  advancement ;  and  as  it  is  in  some 
instances  connected  with  the  arts,  I  shall  here 
introduce  a  copy  of  it,  leaving  out  two  or  three 
paragraphs  of  a  private  family  nature  : 

'Dear  Charles, 

'I  have  intended  to  write  to  you  for  several  days  past,  but 
have  delayed  it  in  expectation  of  a  frank,  which  I  have  got  at  last. 

'I  received  your  Nymph  with  the  Infant  Bacchus  and  a  Satyr, 
which  I  think  a  very  pretty  picture.  I  also  asked  some  Royal 
Academicians  to  view  it,  viz.,  Northcote,  Cos  way,  etc.,  who  approved 
of  it  much  ;  it  is  well  composed,  and  beautifully  coloured  ;  but  the 
hangmen  at  the  Exhibition  have  not  hung  it  in  a  conspicuous  situa- 
tion ;  it  is  placed  in  the  ante-room,  and  pretty  high  ;  but  they  have 
done  the  same  with  two  very  pretty  pictures  of  the  President  himself, 
so  you  must  not  complain.  ...  I  have  been  proceeding  in  my  canvas 
for  the  Associateship,  and  have  great  hopes  of  success— indeed,  it  is  a 
thing  I  have  much  at  heart,  for  I  wish  much  to  see  you  a  Royal 
Academician.  Sir  Joshua's  pictures  are  not  to  be  sold  this  year ;  but 
in  a  few  days  Sir  Thomas  Dundas's  collection  is  to  come  under  Green- 
wood's hammer.     What  a  pity  it  is  that  we  are  not  rich  ! 

'I  am  now  completing  the  arrangement  of  the  Octagon  Room  ;x  but 

1  This  Octagon  Room,  with  an  upper  light,  one  of  a  suite  in  the 
Adelphi,  built  purposely  for  him  by  his  friend  Adam,  was  considered 
by  Mr.  Christie  of  so  excellent  a  shape  for  the  exhibition  of  pictures 
that  he  adopted  it  when  he  fitted  up  his  great  room  in  King  Street, 
St.  James's  Square  ;  so  that  all  pictures  consigned  to  him  for  public 
sale  are  sure  of  receiving  an  equally  good  light.  The  advantage 
derived  from  the  octagonal  shape  is  that  pictures  are  not  continued 
up  to  the  corners,  as  they  most  commonly  are  in  a  square  room,  where 
it  is  impossible  to  stand  to  view  them  to  that  advantage  under  which 


286  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


my  Correggio  is  too  fine  to  hang  up.     It  is  put  into  a  handsome 
mahogany  case,  and  kept  under  lock  and  key. 

'Mr.  Barry  has  been  to  see  it,  and  declares  it  to  be  the  most 
capital  picture  he  had  ever  beheld  ;  and  I  bought  it  at  a  public  sale 
for  £9  9s. 

1 1  am,  with  compliments  to  Sir  John,1 

'  Dear  Charles,  yours,  etc., 

*C.  Whitefoord. 

'  Since  your  worship  has  been  gone,  I  have  taken  mightily  to  the 
young  kitten  ;  she  is  a  very  clever  kit-cat,  and  I  have  taken  some  pains 
about  her  education  ;  she  skips  about  like  a  monkey,  and  sits  up  like  a 
Christian.' 

In  closing  these  notices  of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  I 
must  not  forget  to  mention  her  servant,  Mary 
Fairy.  Her  features,  though  tolerably  handsome, 
were  not  equal  to  her  figure — her  arms  were 
excellent ;  but  it  is  pretty  well  known  that  her 
master  was  rather  afraid  of  her,  since  she  scolded 
him  as  well  as  Mrs.  Nollekens,  and,  indeed,  was 
frequently  so  rude  to  his  visitors  that  her  conduct 
appeared  more  like  an  overbearing  mistress  of  a 
mansion  than  a  dependent.  Mr.  Joseph,  an  associate 
of  the  Royal  Academy,  when  painting  the  portrait 
of  the  Hon.  Mr.  Perceval  from  Mr.  Nollekens' 
mask,  taken  from  that  gentleman's  face  after 
death,  happened  once  to  mention  Mary  Fairy  in  the 

they  are  seen  when  the  corners  of  a  square  are  brought  out  to  form 
the  octagon. — Smith. 

1  Sir  John  Macpherson,  who  had  been  Governor  of  Bengal,  and  to 
whom  Charles  Smith  dedicated  a  musical  entertainment  in  two  acts, 
entitled  'A  Trip  to  Bengal,'  to  which  a  portrait  of  the  author  is  pre- 
fixed, engraved  by  S.  W.  Reynolds  from  a  picture  painted  by  himself. 
This  entertainment,  consisting  of  fifty-two  pages,  was  printed  in  1 802 
for  J.  Ridgway,  and  Black  and  Parry,  London.  At  the  end  is  a 
Glossary  of  Hindostanee  words  used  in  the  work. — Smith. 


FIFING-BOYS  287 


presence  of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  who,  with  her  pre- 
cision of  emphasis,  said,  '  Yes,  sir ;  she  is  Mr. 
Nollekens'  Venus,  sir.'  Mrs.  Nollekens  was  at  this 
time  recollecting,  with  tears  in  her  eyes,  that  she 
had  herself  in  former  days  been  flattered  with  that 
appellation  from  no  less  a  character  than  the 
Marquis  of  ^Rockingham,  who  observed  to  Mr. 
Nollekens,  soon  after  his  marriage:  '  Ah,  Nolle- 
kens, we  now  see  where  you  get  your  Venuses!' 

One  morning,  when  a  fifer  and  drummer  were 
row-de-dowing  to  a  newly-married  couple  at  the 
Sun  and  Horseshoe  at  the  opposite  house  to 
Nollekens',  she  observed  that  her  father,  Mr. 
Welch,  used  to  say  that  fifing-boys  were  first 
introduced  in  the  army  by  the  Culloden  Duke  of 
Cumberland.  I  do  not  recollect  an  earlier  repre- 
sentation of  a  fifing-boy  than  that  introduced  by 
Hogarth  in  his  picture  of  the  '  March  to  Finchley.' 

Mrs.  Nollekens'  female  acquaintances  were  not 
all  equally  well  or  wisely  selected,  some  of  them 
having  been  opera-singers,  and  others  servants  to 
their  husbands,  or  in  some  instances  worse.  Upon 
this  egregious  want  of  common  decorum,  her  late 
steady,  amiable,  and  universally-respected  friend, 
Mrs.  Carter,  would  now  and  then  rate  her  roundly, 
particularly  when  she  perceived  her  to  pay  in- 
creasing attention  to  ladies  for  whom  the  world 
never   cared,  nor   even    spoke   to   till   after   their 


marriage. 


*  You  can  clearly  see,'  she  observed  one  day 
during  a  sale  of  choice  china  at  Christie's,  'that 
duck-footed   woman,   your  "  dear   friend,"  as  you 


288  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

have  just  been  pleased  to  call  her,  is  not  at  all 
noticed  by  the  wives  of  those  gentlemen  to  whom 
her  husband  is  known.  They  all  shun  her  as  they 
would  a  wife  who  had  been  made  over  to  her 
husband  with  what  her  former  possessor  considered 
a  handsome  consideration.  Indeed,  my  old  friend, 
you  should  at  all  events  be  a  little  more  cautious  in 
your  epithets,  or  you  will  at  last,  like  her,  pass 
unnoticed.'  The  truth  was,  that  Mrs.  Carter 
began  to  perceive  that  whenever  persons  of  rank 
noticed  Mrs.  Nollekens,  it  was  only  with  the 
distant  condescension  of,  '  I  hope  Mr.  Nollekens  is 
well  ?' 

Having  given  the  reader  a  sufficient  number  of 
anecdotes  concerning  the  manners  and  peculiarities 
of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  the  Pekuah1  of  Dr.  Johnson's 
'  Rasselas,'  who  will  always  retain  a  lasting  seat 
among  my  most  pleasant  recollections,  I  come  now 
to  speak  of  her  death,  long  previously  to  which  her 
emaciated  frame  had  existed  without  the  use  of  its 
limbs.  She  was  at  length  relieved  from  her  suffer- 
ings in  the  drawing-room  of  her  husband's  house, 
No.  9,  Mortimer  Street,  on  August  17,  1817,  in 
the  seventy -fourth  year  of  her  age,  and  was  interred 
in  the   public  vault  under  Paddington   Church,  on 

1  A  short  time  before  Mrs.  Nollekens'  death  a  gentleman,  in  looking 
round  Nollekens'  studio,  inquired  after  her  health,  observing  that  he 
had  not  seen  her  for  some  time.  '  Oh !'  answered  the  artist,  '  she's 
bad,  very  bad  ;  she's  now  in  bed.  There's  a  mould  of  her  spine  down 
in  that  corner  ;  see  how  crooked  it  is.'  Little  did  Pekuah  think,  when 
her  elegantly-formed  figure  was  attired  in  her  wedding-dress,  that  her 
admiring  husband  would  one  day  display  a  cast  of  her  deformed  spine. 
— Smith. 


FUNERAL  OF  MRS.  NOLLEKENS  289 


the  25th  of  the  same  month.  The  funeral  was 
handsome.  There  were  eleven  mourners,  namely, 
Mr.  Nollekens,  and  Mr.  Peck  of  the  Temple  (one 
of  his  two  cousins),  Mr.  Woodcock  (one  of  Mrs. 
Nollekens'  cousins),  Mr.  John  Taylor  (Frank  Hay- 
man's  only  surviving  pupil),  Mr.  Joseph  Bonomi 
(Mr.  Nollekens'  pupil),  Mr.  Gahagan  (one  of  his 
principal  carvers),  etc. 

Mrs.  Nollekens,  who  was  fond  of  using  lofty 
sentences,  even  upon  the  most  trifling  occasions,  in 
her  will  styled  her  husband  '  The  sun  of  my  life.' 
Upon  this  expression  a  literary  man,  who  at  that 
time  was  slightly  known  to  Mr.  Nollekens,  passed 
many  compliments  ;  though,  as  a  reader,  he  might 
have  known  that  the  idea  was  borrowed  from  old 
Fuller,  who  says,  when  speaking  of  a  female  who 
had  been  kind  to  him  in  sickness,  '  She  was  the 
medicine  of  my  life.' 

Upon  the  death  of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  her  husband, 
who  had  received  the  condolence  of  Mrs.  Zoffany, 
Mrs.  Lloyd,  and  other  steady  old  friends,  conducted 
himself  with  all  possible  dolefulness  and  customary 
propriety,  pacing  his  room  up  and  down  with  his 
hands  in  his  pockets,  and  for  a  time,  I  really 
believe,  felt  the  want  of  her  company,  deplorable 
as  it  had  been  for  the  last  three  years.  However, 
many  ladies  stoutly  maintain  an  opinion  that  very 
few  gentlemen  die  of  grief  for  their  departed  wives  ; 
and  that  short  and  not  very  distant  removals  to  a 
lively  prospect  where  new  faces  may  be  seen 
generally  bring  about  a  change  in  the  worldly 
affairs  of  men.     And  as  if  he  had   been   for  too 

19 


290  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

long  a  time  what  is  usually  denominated  '  hen- 
pecked,' Mr.  Nollekens  soon  sported  two  mould- 
candles  instead  of  one,  took  wine  oftener,  sat  up 
later,  laid  in  bed  longer,  and  would,  though  he 
made  no  change  whatever  in  his  coarse  manner  of 
feeding,  frequently  ask  his  morning  visitor  to  dine 
with  him  ;  and  I  have  been  informed  that  the  late 
Rev.  Thomas  Kerrich,  principal  librarian  of  the 
University  Library  of  Cambridge,  to  my  very  great 
astonishment,  had  stomach  enough  to  partake  of 
one  of  his  repasts.  As  for  my  part,  his  viands  were 
so  dirtily  cooked  with  half -melted  butter,  mountains 
high  of  flour,  and  his  habits  of  eating  so  filthy,  that 
he  never  could  prevail  upon  me  to  sicken  myself  at 
any  one  of  his  feasts. 

He  continued  now  and  then  to  amuse  himself 
with  his  modelling-clay,  and  frequently  gave  tea 
and  other  entertainments  to  some  one  of  his  old 
models,  who  generally  left  his  house  a  bank-note  or 
two  richer  than  they  arrived.  Indeed,  so  stupidly 
childish  was  he  at  times,  that  one  of  his  Venuses, 
who  had  grown  old  in  her  practices,  coaxed  him 
out  of  £10  to  enable  her  to  make  him  a  plum- 
pudding  ;  and  he  grew  so  luxuriantly  brilliant  in 
his  ideas  of  morning  pleasures,  that  he  would  fre- 
quently, on  a  Sunday  particularly,  order  a  hackney- 
coach  to  be  sent  for,  and  take  Taylor,  Bonomi, 
Goblet,  and  sometimes  his  neighbour,  the  publican's 
wife  from  the  Sun  and  Horseshoe,  a  ride  out  of 
town  of  about  ten  or  twelve  miles  before  dinner. 
Now  and  then,  however,  in  consequence  of  his 
neglecting  his  former  cautious  custom  of  bargaining 


SERVANTS  291 


for  the  fare  before  he  started,  he  had  a  dispute  with 
the  coachman  on  his  return  as  to  the  exact  distance, 
to  the  no  small  amusement  of  Bronze  and  his  brawny 
old  Scotch  nurse,  a  woman  whose  blotchy  skin  and 
dirty  habits  even  Nollekens  declared  to  be  most 
obnoxious  to  his  feelings,  and  wretchedly  nasty  in 
her  mode  of  dressing  his  victuals. 

I  must  freely  declare  that  in  some  respects  Nolle- 
kens,  aged  as  he  was,  attempted  to  practise  the 
usual  method  of  renovation  of  some  of  that  species 
of  widowers  who  have  not  the  least  inclination 
whatever  to  follow  their  wives  too  hastily.  Mrs. 
Nollekens  had  left  him  with  his  handsome  maid, 
who  became  possessed  of  her  mistress's  wardrobe, 
which  she  quickly  sold  and  cut  up  to  her  advantage. 
Her  common  name  of  Mary  soon  received  the  adjunct 
of  Pretty  from  her  kind  master  himself,  who  seldom 
took  the  liberty  of  addressing  her  without  it.  As 
it  soon  appeared,  however,  that  '  pretty  Mary,'  who 
had  an  eye  to  her  master's  disengaged  hand,  took 
upon  herself  mightily,  and  used  her  master  rather 
roughly,  she  was  one  day  very  properly,  though 
unceremoniously,  put  out  of  the  house  before  her 
schemes  were  brought  to  perfection. 

I  must  not,  however,  quit  Mrs.  Nollekens  without 
mentioning  some  circumstances  of  her  survivor, 
Mrs.  Lloyd.  She  now  and  then  gave  the  retort- 
courteous  to  Mrs.  Paradice,  a  woman  she  detested, 
and  who  once  allowed  her  passion  to  overpower  her 
good  sense,  of  which  in  general  she  had  a  pretty 
good  share  ;  which  overflowing  of  her  gall  took 
place  at  Mrs.  Nollekens'  table  when  Dr.  Johnson 


292  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

was  present.  Mrs.  Paradice's  figure  was  so  neat 
and  small  that  Mrs.  Lloyd  called  her  a  sylph. 
'  Better  to  be  so,'  rejoined  Mrs.  P.,  '  than  to  be  as 
dull-looking  and  blind  as  a  mole.'  c  Mole  as  I  am,' 
said  Mrs.  Lloyd,  f  I  never  added  to  the  weight  of 
Paul  Jodrell's  phaeton.'  '  Fie  !  fie  !  my  dears,'  ex- 
claimed the  Doctor,  '  no  sparring  ;  off  with  your 
mufflers,  and  fight  it  fairly  out  !' 

At  this  time  Miss  Welch,  who  communicated 
this  anecdote  to  me,  frowned  at  Mrs.  Nollekens  for 
suffering  her  house  to  be  made  the  seat  of  discord  ; 
and  that  lady  particularly  requested  Mrs.  Paradice, 
for  whom  she  entertained  no  high  respect,  to 
suspend  the  altercation,  adding  that  such  remarks 
were  not  altogether  ladylike.  Mrs.  Lloyd,  though 
she  was  pretty  honest  in  what  she  at  any  time  said, 
continued  to  bear  no  ill-will  towards  her  little 
antagonist,  as  will  appear  by  the  following  extract 
of  a  letter  which  she  wrote  to  Mr.  West  in  1805  : 

'  I  am  glad  that  our  old  acquaintance,  Mrs.  Paradice,  got  safe  to 
America.  Although  she  and  I  used  to  say  unkind  things  sometimes 
to  each  other,  I  should  have  been  sorry  any  harm  had  happened  to  her, 
as  I  think  she  has  many  worthy  qualities  ;  in  consideration  of  which, 
when  she  is  out  of  my  sight  I  like  her  very  well,  and  can  think  of  her 
with  commiseration.' 

Mrs.  Lloyd  was  so  near-sighted  that  her  nose, 
when  she  was  painting,  was  within  an  inch  of  the 
canvas  ;  and  it  is  astonishing,  with  such  an  in- 
firmity, about  Which  Mrs.  Paradice  exposed  herself 
by  ignorantly  comparing  her  to  a  mole,  that  she 
could  display  such  harmony  in  her  performances. 
Her  pictures  of  flowers,  for  which  she  was  so 
deservedly  famed,  possess  a  tasteful  elegance  of 


ONE  OF  GARRICK'S  PLAYBILLS  293 

composition,  a  clearness  of  colouring,  and,  in  most 
instances,  exquisite  finishing.  She  was  remarkably 
choice  in  the  colour  she  used,  preferring  ultramarine 
upon  all  occasions  wherever  blue  was  required. 
My  worthy  friend  Mr.  Sharp,1  the  painter  of  '  The 
King,  God  bless  him  !'  purchased  Mrs.  Lloyd's 
colour-box,  in  which  he  found  a  curious  colour 
twisted  up  in  one  of  Garrick's  playbills,  which, 
with  his  usual  good-nature,  he  gave  to  me.  This 
bill  is  valuable  for  more  points  than  one,  as  the 
play  which  it  announced  was  to  be  performed  on 
May  7  for  the  benefit  of  the  poor  debtors  in  the 
Marshalsea  Prison  ;  and  as  it  has  been  considered  a 
great  curiosity  by  many  of  the  numerous  playbill 
collectors  to  whom  it  has  been  shown,  I  shall  here 
insert  a  copy  of  it. 

FOE    THE    BENEFIT    OF    THE    PEISONEES 

Confined  for  Debt  in  the  Marshalsea  Prison,  Southwark. 

(Being  their  first  application  of  this  kind.) 

Theatre  Royal,  in  Drury  Lane, 

On  Monday  next,  being  the  7th  of  May, 

Will  be  presented  a  Comedy,  called, 

THE  PEOVOKED  WIFE. 

The  part  of  Sir  John  Brute  to  be  performed 

by  Mr.  GARRICK. 

Constant,  by  Mr.  Havard. 

Heartfree,  by  Mr.  Palmer. 

Col.  Bully  (with  proper  Songs),  by  Mr.  Beard. 

Razor,  by  Mr.  Yates. 

Lord  Rake,  by  Mr.  Blakes.' 

Lady  Fanciful,  by  Mrs.  Clive. 

Belinda,  by  Mrs.  Willoughby. 

Mademoiselle,  by  Mrs.  Green. 

1  Michael  William  Sharp,  a  painter  of  jocose  and  social  pictures. 
He  survived  until  1840.— Ed. 


294  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

And  the  part  of  Lady  Brute,  to  be  performed  by 

Mrs.  Pritchard. 

With  Dancing, 

By  Mons.  Grandchamps,  Mad.  Auretti,  Mr.  Mathews,  &c. 

To  which  will  be  added  a  Farce,  called, 

DUKE  AND  NO  DUKE. 

The  part  of  Trappolin  to  be  performed 
by  Mr.  WOODWARD. 
Boxes  5s.     Pit  3s.     First  Gallery  2s.     Upper  Gallery  Is. 
Tickets  to  be  had  at  the  Marshalsea  Prison,  Southwark,  and  of  Mr. 
Hobson,  at  the  Stage-door,  of  whom  places  may  be  taken. 

On  Tuesday  next,  Loves  Last  Shift.     For  the  Benefit  of  Mr.  Dunbar, 
Mr.  Jones,  Mr.  Atkinson,  Mr.  Priehard,  and  Mr.  Bride. 

Mrs.  Mary  Lloyd  leaving  a  will  which  she  wrote 
herself,  and  in  which  appear  the  names  both  of 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nollekens,  Mrs.  Benjamin  West,  with 
her  usual  kindness,  has  enabled  me  to  lay  the 
following  copy  before  the  reader  : 

1  Written  in  the  year  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and  one. 

'  This  is  the  last  Will  and  Testament  of  me,  Mary  Lloyd,  widow  of 
the  late  Hugh  Lloyd,  Esq.  I  am  now  residing  in  John  Street,  in  the 
Parish  of  St.  Pancras,  in  the  County  of  Middlesex.  First,  I  direct 
that  all  my  just  debts,  funeral  expenses,  and  the  charges  of  the 
Probate  of  this  my  Will,  shall  be  paid  by  my  Executors  hereinafter 
named.  I  give  and  bequeath  unto  Joseph  Nollekens,  Esq.,  of  Mortimer 
Street,  and  Joseph  Moser,  Esq.,  of  Princes  Street,  Spitalfields,  and 
the  survivor,  and  the  executors,  administrators,  or  assigns  of  such 
survivor,  all  my  money  in  the  public  funds  called  the  Long  Annuities, 
upon  trust  that  they  the  said  Joseph  Nollekens  and  the  said  Joseph 
Moser,  or  the  survivor  of  them,  or  the  executors,  administrators,  or 
assigns  of  such  survivor  of  them,  shall  and  do,  during  the  natural  life 
of  my  cousin  Elizabeth  Graham,  wife  of  John  Graham,  pay  and  apply 
out  of  the  interest  or  dividends  in  the  Long  Annuities,  forty  pounds 
every  year  to  her  use  ;  and  I  direct  that  the  said  Elizabeth  Graham 
shall  receive  the  dividends  herself  at  the  Bank ;  and  I  direct  that  the 
said  Elizabeth  receive  the  forty  pounds  a  year  free  and  clear  of  and 
from  all  tax,  charge,  and  deductions  whatever  ;  and  after  the  decease 
of  the  aforesaid  Elizabeth  Graham,  I  direct  that  the  eight  hundred 


MRS.  LLOYD'S  WILL  295 

pounds,  from  which  the  dividends  of  forty  pounds  were  paid,  shall  be 
divided  amongst  the  children  of  the  said  Elizabeth  in  equal  shares,  if 
she  should  not  make  a  will ;  but  if  she  should  make  a  will  in  favour 
of  any  child  or  children,  the  eight  hundred  pounds,  after  her  decease, 
shall  be  divided  according  to  such  will ;  but  the  money  must  not  be 
willed  by  the  said  Elizabeth  Graham  to  any  person  or  persons  except 
her  children,  unless  she  should  survive  them  all ;  in  that  case  she  may 
give  the  eight  hundred  pounds  to  whom  she  pleases  after  her  decease  ; 
and  I  direct  that  the  said  Elizabeth  Graham  shall  not  make  over  to 
any  one  person  or  persons  the  beforenamed  dividends  of  forty  pounds 
per  year,  but  always  receive  the  interest  herself  of  the  eight  hundred 
pounds.  I  give  and  bequeath  to  my  dear  friend  Mary  Nollekens,  the 
wife  of  Joseph  Nollekens,  fifty  pounds,  to  be  transferred  to  her  out 
of  the  Long  Annuities.  I  give  and  bequeath  to  Juliet  Moser,  the  wife 
of  Joseph  Moser,  fifty  pounds,  to  be  transferred  to  her  out  of  the 
Long  Annuities.  I  give  and  bequeath  to  John  Graham,  husband  of 
Elizabeth  Graham,  fifty  pounds,  to  be  transferred  to  him  out  of  the 
Long  Annuities.  I  give  and  bequeath  to  Conradt  Habbick,  of  Schaf- 
hausen,  the  nephew  of  my  father  George  Michel  Moser,  twenty  guineas ; 
if  he  should  be  dead,  the  money  to  be  divided  among  my  executors. 
I  give  and  bequeath  to  my  cousin  Rachel  Schewier,  the  wife  of  Jacques 
Schewier,  late  residing  at  Neuwied,  twenty  guineas.  If  the  said  Rachel 
Schewier  should  be  dead,  I  direct  the  twenty  guineas  to  be  paid  to  her 
son  ;  if  he  should  be  dead,  I  give  it  to  my  executors.  I  give  and 
bequeath  to  Elizabeth  West,  wife  of  Benjamin  West,  Esq.,  fifty 
pounds,  to  be  transferred  to  her  out  of  the  Long  Annuities.  I  give 
and  bequeath  to  George  Panbury  the  Elder,  twenty  guineas.  I  give 
my  silver  teapot,  and  my  silver  caddy,  and  silver  milk-ewer,  to  Char- 
lotte Harward,  the  wife  of  Charles  Harward,  Esq.,  with  my  best 
wishes  for  her  prosperity.  I  give  and  bequeath  to  Maria  Cosway,  the 
wife  of  Richard  Cosway,  twenty  guineas  for  a  ring.  I  desire  that  my 
drawings,  prints,  and  books  of  prints,  may  be  divided  between  Benjamin 
West,  Esq.,  and  Joseph  Nollekens,  Esq.,  and  that  they  may  make  them 
into  two  parcels,  and  draw  lots  for  them.  I  desire  that  Richard 
Cosway,  Esq.,  may  choose  any  three  pictures  he  pleases.  I  give  to 
Francis  Ellis,  daughter  of  Hugh  Ellis,  Esq.,  of  Carnarvon,  my  ring 
with  my  late  husband's  hair  ;  it  is  set  round  with  diamonds  ;  and 
twenty  guineas.  To  the  servant  who  lives  with  me  at  the  time  of 
my  death  I  give  ten  pounds. 

'  The  residue  of  my  fortune  of  every  kind  I  give  to  my  cousin 
Joseph  Moser,  Esq. 

'  As  I  have  written  the  above  with  my  own  hand,  I  am  informed 


296  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

a  witness  is  not  required  ;  and  I  do  constitute,  nominate,  and  appoint 

the  aforesaid  Joseph  Nollekens  and  Joseph  Moser  executors  of  this 

my  last  will. 

'Mary  Lloyd, 

22nd  Aug.,  1801. 

'  I  request  to  be  buried  in  the  same  grave  with  my  late  husband, 
Hugh  Lloyd,  Esq.,  if  I  should  die  in  this  country. 

'Mary  Lloyd.'1 

Mrs.  Lloyd,  who  was  much  respected  by  the 
Eoyal  Family,  was  visited  by  the  late  Queen 
Charlotte,  and  had  also  the  honour  to  receive  the 
following  letter  from  her  Royal  Highness  the 
Princess  Elizabeth  : 

'My  dear  Mrs.  Lloyd, 

'  To  show  you  that  though  out  of  sii?ht  you  are  not  out  of 
mind,  I  send  you  a  very  quiet,  sober-coloured  gown,  to  show  you  that 
you  have  a  sincere  and  old  friend  in 

'Eliza.2 
'Jan.  20th.' 

Mrs.  Lloyd  died  at  ten  o'clock  on  Sunday 
morning,  May  2,  1819,  in  the  front  second -floor 
room  of  her  lodgings,  No.  21,  Upper  Thornhaugh 
Street,  Tottenham  Court  Road,  and  was  buried  on 
the  10th  of  the  same  month  at  Kensington,  in  the 
grave  of  her  husband,  according  to  her  request. 

Mr.  Nollekens  was  not  very  particular  as  to  the 
material  he  used  to  render  his  skin  clean.  When- 
ever he  had  been  modelling,  a  small  bit  of  clay 
commonly  answered  the  purpose,  and,  after  shaving, 

1  Mrs.  Lloyd,  when  Miss  Moser,  obtained  the  following  premiums 
from  the  Society  of  Arts  : 

In  1758,  for  a  drawing,  £5  5s. 

In  1759,  for  a  ditto,  £5  5s.— Smith. 

2  The  original  is  in  the  possession  of  Mrs.  Nichols,  who  kindly 
permitted  me  to  copy  it. — Smith. 


SNUFF  297 


the  barber's  cloth,  upon  which  a  variety  of  customers 
had  already  wiped  themselves,  was  considered  both 
convenient  and  economical. 

He  took  snuff,  but  seldom  used  his  handkerchief  ; 
and  the  custom  of  the  common  drovers  was  too 
often  practised  by  him  to  render  the  assistance  of 
that  truly  cleanly  article  necessary  upon  all 
occasions.  By  long  experience  he  was  convinced 
that  employing  the  common  shoe-cleaner  was  by 
far  the  cheapest  mode,  for  that  by  standing  over 
him  when  he  was  putting  on  the  blacking  to  the 
brush  he  had  a  pennyworth  for  his  halfpenny,  so 
that  when  he  wanted  to  go  out  two  days  running, 
the  quantity  of  blacking  enabled  him,  with  a  little 
moisture  applied  to  his  own  shiner,  to  make  them 
do.  He  chewed  tobacco,  it  mattered  not  to  him 
whether  shag  or  pigtail  ;  and  for  the  most  part  his 
supply  was  gratuitous  by  his  sawyer  or  his  polisher, 
who  both  kept  in  his  good  opinion  by  continuing 
the  habit  of  chewing  it,  and  they  both  were  equally 
eager  to  allow  their  polished  iron-box  to  shine  in 
the  sun  whenever  he  came  to  converse  with  them, 
upon  either  the  clearness  or  softness  of  the  stone 
upon  which  they  were  engaged. 

Snuff  was  a  luxury  he  at  all  times  expected  to 
find  in  the  studio,  and  was  highly  pleased  that  the 
generality  of  its  takers  preferred  rappee,  and  also 
that  they  confined  their  custom  to  the  same  shop — 
Simpson's,  in  Princes  Street — as  the  varieties  of 
manufacture  were  apt  to  render  his  nose  sore.  But 
it  was  very  remarkable  that  at  one  time,  when  he 
was  an  extensive  snuff-taker,  he  would  put  up  with 


298  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

an  early  pinch  of  Scotch  from  a  North  Briton,  who 
industriously  made  seven  days  in  the  week  by 
attending  an  hour  earlier  and  staying  an  hour  later 
than  the  rest  of  his  workmen.  Nollekens  certainly 
kept  a  box,  but  then  if  was  very  often  in  his  other 
coat-pocket,  an  apology  frequently  made  when  he 
partook  of  that  refreshment  at  the  expense  of 
another. 

If  any  one  of  his  labourers  found  a  feather  and 
tied  it  to  the  string  of  the  oil-bottle,  to  enable 
Nollekens  to  oil  the  locks,  bars,  bolts,  and  hinges 
of  the  doors,  without  wasting  the  oil  upon  a  worn- 
out  quill,  he  was  delighted  beyond  measure.  The 
man  who  put  it  there  was  sure  to  be  questioned  as 
to  the  place  he  found  it  in  ;  and  if  he  happened  to 
say  Oxford  Market,  Nollekens  exulted  upon  re- 
flecting that  he  stood  some  chance  of  having  his 
sixpennyworth  for  the  money  the  butchers  exacted 
of  him  for  exhibiting  to  him  their  house  of  snow. 

Nollekens  had  no  wish  to  visit  those  gardens  of 
Damascus  at  Kensington,  shaded  by  lofty  trees  and 
adorned  by  fragrant  shrubs,  under  whose  refreshing 
shades  he  might  have  enjoyed  the  cooling  breezes 
from  the  waters.  The  place  in  which  he  most 
delighted  was  Primrose  Hill,  where  he  was  to  be 
seen  in  the  summer  season,  either  fagging  up  or 
running  down  its  heated  declivities,  almost  destitute 
of  even  bramble  or  brier.  Often  have  I  been  nearlv 
scorched  to  death  when  walking  with  him,  as  he 
invariably  gave  preference  to  the  sunny  side  of  the 
street,  while  his  dog  Cerberus,  by  way  of  a  treat, 
walked  in  the  shade. 


HENRY  JERNIGAN  299 

John  Barnard,  Esq.,  nicknamed  Jacky  Barnard, 
who  was  very  fond  of  showing  his  collection  of 
Italian  drawings,  expressed  surprise  that  Mr. 
Nollekens  did  not  pay  a  sufficient  attention  to  them. 
'  Yes  I  do,'  replied  he  ;  '  but  I  saw  many  of  them 
at  Jenkins's,  at  Rome,  while  the  man  was  making 
them  for  my  friend  Crone,  the  artist,  one  of  yonr 
agents.'  This  so  offended  Mr.  Barnard,  who  piqned 
himself  upon  his  judgment,  that  he  scratched 
Nollekens  out  of  his  will. 

Walking  with  Mr.  Nollekens  to  see  Mr.  Grignon's 
pictures,  consigned  to  him  from  Rome  by  his 
brother  Charles,  just  as  we  were  going  up  to  his 
door,  No.  10,  Great  Russell  Street,  Covent  Garden, 
Mr.  Nollekens  regretted  that  he  had  left  home 
without  putting  the  Jernigan  medal  into  his  pocket, 
as  Mr.  Grignon  had  promised  to  give  him  some 
account  of  it. 

What  information  Mr.  Nollekens  obtained  I 
know  not ;  but  I  find  that  in  one  of  Mr.  Grignon's 
interesting  letters  to  me  upon  my  Covent  Garden 
collections,  he  mentions  it  in  the  following  words  : 

'Henry  Jernigan  was  a  silversmith  and  Roman  Catholic  banker, 
residing  in  London,  and  had  offices  in  Jermyn  Street  and  Great 
Russell  Street,  and  in  the  house  in  which  I  now  reside.  He  had 
a  lottery  for  jewellery  which  he  could  not  dispose  of,1  and  to 
those  persons  who  were  unfortunate  he  presented  medals.  The 
number  of  his  tickets  amounted  to  30,000,  at  seven  or  ten  shillings 
each.' 

Jernigan  died  October  8,  1761,  was  buried  in  the 
churchyard  of  St.  Paul,  Covent  Garden,  and  upon 

1  A  large  cistern  of  silver  was  the  grand  prize. — Smith. 


300  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

his  tombstone  are   the   following   lines  by  Aaron 
Hill: 

'  All  that  accomplished  body  lends  mankind, 
From  earth  receiving,  he  to  earth  resign'd. 
All  that  e'er  graced  a  soul,  from  Heaven  he  drew, 
And  took  back  with  him,  as  an  angel's  due.' 

'  Yon  must  sometimes  be  much  annoyed,'  observed 
a  lady,  addressing  herself  to  Mr.  Nollekens,  c  by 
the  ridiculous  remarks  made  by  your  sitters  and 
their  flattering  friends  after  you  have  produced  a 
good  likeness.'  '  No,  ma'am,  I  never  allow  any- 
body to  fret  me.  I  tell  'em  all,  "  If  you  don't  like 
it,  don't  take  it."  This  may  be  done  by  an  artist 
who  is  what  is  usually  termed  '  tiled  in  ' ;  but  the 
dependent  man  is  sometimes  known  to  submit  to 
observations,  as  the  witty  Northcote  has  stated, 
even  from  4  nursery-maids,  both  wet  and  dry.' 
This  observation  occurs  in  a  paper  addressed  to 
Prince  Hoare,  dated  June  20,  1807,  in  an  enter- 
taining work  edited  by  that  gentleman,  entitled 
'  The  Artist.' 

Notwithstanding  the  professed  independence  of 
Nollekens,  however,  he  not  unfrequently  has  been 
known  to  appear  to  comply  with  the  wishes  of  his 
employers,  who  in  most  instances  consider  they 
have  an  unequivocal  right  to  maintain  their  ignorant 
opinions  for  articles  bespoken  by  them,  and  for 
which  they  are  to  give  cheques  ;  and  so  they  cer- 
tainly have,  if  they  confine  their  observations  to 
their  household  furniture.  But  I  must  declare 
that  persons  of  real  taste  and  good  sense  are  at  all 
times  better  pleased  with  a  work  x>f  art  that  has 


NOLLEKENS1  HABITS  301 

emanated  entirely  from  the  mind  of  a  talented  man, 
who  has  deeply  studied  his  subject.  Nollekens,  I 
was  about  to  observe,  at  times,  like  many  other 
sculptors,  played  off  the  old  practice  by  pretending 
to  cut  away  whenever  the  employer  pronounced  a 
lip  too  pouting,  an  eye  too  crow-footed,  or  a  brow 
too  severe.  This  deception  of  cutting  away  is 
effected  by  the  help  of  a  little  stone-dust,  which  the 
sculptor  allows  to  fall  gradually  from  his  hand 
every  time  he  strikes  his  chisel  or  moves  his  rasp, 
until  the  critic  cries,  c  Stop,  stop !  don't  cut  away 
too  much ;  that  will  do  admirably  well.  Now, 
don't  you  see,  my  dear  sir,  how  wonderfully  that 
has  improved  it  ?' 

Nollekens  observed  one  morning,  after  he  had 
attended  Sir  Joshua's  lecture  at  the  Royal  Academy 
the  preceding  evening,  that  he  believed  all  the 
deformed  students  in  the  Academy  had  assembled 
together  upon  one  spot  while  waiting  the  open- 
ing of  the  lecture-room,  since  he  had  noticed 
Eyley,  Flaxman,  the  two  Edwards,  Crone,  and 
Feary. 

Whenever  Nollekens  was  asked  in  the  presence 
of  his  wife  if  he  had  any  family,  she  would  answer, 
pointing  to  his  figures,  '  A  very  great  family,  sir. 
All  these  are  Mr.  Nollekens'  children  ;  and  as  they 
behave  so  well,  and  never  make  a  noise,  they  shall 
be  his  representatives,'  at  the  same  time  making  a 
most  formal  curtsey  to  Mr.  Nollekens. 

He  seldom  wrote  long  letters  :  Lady  Newborough 
was  one  of  the  most  favoured  of  this  friends.  To 
her  he  wrote  Jong  epistles  ;    and  so    '  unbosomed 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


himself,'  as  he  called  it,  by  offering  his  advice  about 
her  domestic  concerns,  that  she  was  pleased,  when 
she  wrote  in  reply,  to  call  him  her  father. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  French  Revolution, 
when  such  immense  numbers  of  priests  threw  them- 
selves upon  the  hospitality  of  this  country,  Nolle  - 
kens  was  highly  indignant  at  the  great  quantity  of 
bread  they  consumed.  '  Why,  do  you  know,  now,' 
said  he,  '  there's  one  of  'em  living  next  door  but 
one  to  me  that  eats  two  whole  quartern  loaves  a 
day  to  his  own  share  !  and  I  am  sure  the  fellow's 
body  could  not  be  bigger  if  he  was  to  eat  up  his 
blanket.' 

Whenever  Nollekens  crossed  the  water  he  always 
carried  the  money  the  waterman  was  to  have  for 
his  fare  in  his  mouth  :  he  kept  it  between  his  teeth, 
not  in  imitation  of  Egyptian  mummies,  whose 
mouths  held  a  piece  of  gold  to  pay  old  Charon  his 
fare,  but  in  order  that  he  might  not,  in  getting  out 
of  the  boat,  lose  his  money  by  taking  more  out  than 
he  wanted. 

He  never  suffered  his  tenants  to  remain  long  after 
their  rents  were  due  without  reminding  them  how 
matters  stood  ;  and  when  he  applied  by  letters,  he 
stated  that  a  quarter's  rent  was  due  on  November  10 
last,  for  which  he  requested  payment  to  be  made 
on  or  before  Thursday  next,  by  twelve  o'clock  at 
noon,  having  occasion  for  a  sum  of  money.  Of 
late  years,  however,  in  consequence  of  his  having 
so  many  houses,  he  employed  an  agent  to  collect 
for  him,  so  that,  at  all  events,  his  bodily  fatigue 
was  lessened. 


ECCENTRICITIES  303 

Mr.  Browne,1  one  of  Nollekens'  old  friends,  after 
having  received  repeated  invitations  to  l  step  in  and 
take  pot-luck  with  him,'  one  day  took  him  at  his 
word.  The  sculptor  apologized  for  his  entertain- 
ment by  saying  that,  as  it  was  Friday,  Mrs.  Nolle  - 
kens  had  proposed  to  take  fish  with  him,  so  that 
they  had  bought  a  few  sprats,  of  which  he  was 
wiping  some  in  a  dish,  whilst  she  was  turning  others 
on  the  gridiron. 

One  day,  when  Mr.  Nollekens  was  walking  in 
Cavendish  Square,  attended  by  his  man  Dodimy, 
he  desired  him  to  take  up  some  sop  which  a  boy 
had  just  thrown  out  of  a  beer-pot,  observing  that  it 
would  make  a  nice  dinner  for  his  dog  Cerberus. 
c  Lord,  sir !  I  take  it  up  !'  exclaimed  Dodimy. 
1  What,  in  the  sight  of  your  friends,  Lord  Bes[s]- 
borough  and  Lord  Brownlow  ?  See,  sir,  there's 
Mr.  Shee  looking  down  at  you.  No,  sir,  I  would 
not  do  it  if  you  were  even  to  scratch  me  !'  When- 
ever Dodimy  displeased  his  master  he  commonly 
threatened  to  scratch  him,  meaning  out  of  his 
will,  which  he  finally  did,  and  gave  his  intended 
annuity  of  £30  to  his  principal  assistant,  Mr.  Gob- 
let, as  the  long  promised  provision  for  himself  and 
family  ! 

As  I  have  given  so  many  instances  of  the  mean- 
ness of  the  wealthy  sculptor,  I  should  feel  very  con- 
siderable regret  if  I  omitted  to  record  any  act  of 
his  which  bears  the  least  appearance  of  liberality  ; 

1  The  late  Mr.  Browne  was  father  to  George  Howe  Browne,  Esq., 
the  highly -respected  Secretary  to  the  Westminster  Fire -Office. — 
Smith. 


3o4  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

and  it  gives  me  pleasure  to  say  that  I  have  been 
assured  by  Mr.  Turner,  the  Eoyal  Academician, 
that  when  he  solicited  Mr.  Nollekens  for  his  sub- 
scription to  the  Artists'  Fund,  he  inquired  how 
much  he  wanted  from  him.  c  Only  a  guinea,'  was 
the  answer  ;  upon  which  the  sculptor  immediately 
opened  a  table -drawer  and  gave  Mr.  Turner  thirty 
guineas,  saying,  c  There,  take  that.'  Mr.  Bailey,1 
the  Royal  Academician,  was  also  equally  surprised 
when  he  applied  to  him  on  behalf  of  the  Artists' 
Society,  to  which  he  is  a  subscriber.  And  yet  this 
man  was  continually  exercising  his  thoughts  to 
devise  the  cheapest  meal  he  could  possibly  take  ; 
and  has  been  seen  disputing  with  a  half-starved 
and  slipshod  cobbler  because  he  refused  to  put  a 
few  more  nails  in  his  ^hoes,  having  entered  into  an 
agreement  to  pay  him  the  sum  of  twopence  for  their 
mending ! 

As  a  piece  of  topographical  gossip  relative  to  an 
old  house,  the  fame  of  which  has  been  perpetuated 
in  the  Spectator,  I  shall  close  the  present  chapter 
with  the  following  information  touching  the  re- 
nowned shop  of  Bat  Pidgeon. 

Mr.  Nollekens  informed  me  that  his  mother  took 
her  children  to  have  their  hair  cut  at  the  Three 
Pigeons,  in  the  Strand  ;  and  having  heard  my 
friend  Mr.  Sheldrake  state  that  that  shop  had  been 
the  one  formerly  kept  by  the  famous  Bat  Pidgeon, 
I  begged  of  him  to  favour  me  with  what  he  knew 

1  Edward   Hodges   Bailey,  the  sculptor  (1788-1867),  a  pupil  and 
imitator  of  Flaxman. — Ed. 


BAT  PIDGEON  305 


about  it,  and  the  following  letter  is  the  result  of 
my  inquiry  : 


1  January  18,  1823. 
'Dear  Sir, 

'  I  well  remember  Bat  Pidgeon's  house  in  the  Strand  ;  it  was 
nearly  opposite  Norfolk  Street.  It  bore  a  sign  of  Three  Pigeons, 
underneath  which  was  written,  "Bat  Pidgeon";  beneath  which  was 
another  inscription,  "late  Bat  Pidgeon." 

'Since  our  conversation  I  have  examined  the  spot;  the  original 
brickwork  of  the  house  is  there,  but  the  shop-front  has  been 
modernized.  The  house  is  now  numbered  277,  and  is  inhabited  by 
Mr.  Wilson,  manufacturer  of  ornamental  bair,  etc.  I  talked  with  Mr. 
Wilson,  who  has  no  knowledge  of  his  ancestors,  if  I  may  so  call  them, 
but  said  he  well  knows  that  his  house  bore  the  sign  of  "  The  Three 
Pigeons."  I  remember  them  and  the  inscriptions  many  years  of  my 
early  life,  long  after  the  year  1770,  but  I  cannot  recollect  the  names 
of  Bat's  successors. 

'I  enclose  Mr.  Wilson's  card,  which  will  lead  you  to  the  house. 
'I  am,  dear  Sir, 

1  Yours  sincerely, 

'  T.  Sheldrake. 
'J.  T.  Smith,  Esq.' 


20 


[306] 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  confessor— Description  of  the  sculptor's  house,  paint- 
ings, etc. — His  indifference  towards  religion  and  sacred  subjects  in 
art — Decoration  of  churches  and  exhibition  of  Westminster  Abbey 
— Mr.  Nollekens  and  Sir  William  Staines — Anecdotes  of  Biagio 
Rebecca— The  Pond  family — Anthony  Pasquin — Canal  excursions 
— Mrs.  Lobb  and  living  models — Mr.  Nollekens'  visit  to  the  British 
Museum — Recollections  of  his  manners,  etc. — Eccentricity  in  persons 
of  eminent  talent — The  advantages  of  greatness — Mr.  Nollekens  and 
his  patrons  and  visitors. 

Mr.  Nollekens  was  in  possession  of  a  set  of  those 
extremely  rare  engravings  from  the  Aretin  subjects, 
so  often  mentioned  by  print-collectors  ;  but  it  so 
happened,  as  he  was  glancing  at  them  one  day,  that 
his  confessor  came  in,  who  insisted  upon  their  being 
put  into  the  fire  before  he  would  give  him  absolu- 
tion. I  once  saw  them,  and  he  lent  them  to  Cos  way 
to  make  tracings  from  them.  However,  this  loan 
Cos  way  stoutly  denied,  which  when  Nollekens 
heard,  he  exclaimed :  '  He's  a  damned  liar  ;  that 
everybody  knows !  And  I  know  this,  that  I  could 
hardly  get  them  back  again  out  of  his  hands.' 
Upon  Nollekens  being  asked  how  he,  as  an  artist, 
could  make  up  his  mind  to  burn  them,  he  answered, 
c  The  priest  made  me  do  it  ;'  and  he  was  now  and 
then  seen  to  shed  tears  for  what  he  called  his  folly. 


BRONZE  AND  HER  KITCHEN  307 


He  was  frequently  questioned  thus :  '  Where  did  you 
get  them,  sir  ?  Whose  were  they  ?'  His  answer 
was  :  c  I  brought  them  all  the  way  from  Rome.' 

The  rigid  economy  and  eccentricity  of  Mr. 
Nollekens  were  scarcely  more  remarkable  in  his 
person  and  manners  than  in  his  dwelling,  of  which 
I  shall  now  give  the  reader  a  short  description. 
The  kitchen  was  paved  with  odd  bits  of  stone,  close 
to  the  dusthole,  which  was  infested  with  rats.  The 
drains  had  long  been  choked  up  ;  and  the  windows 
were  glazed  with  glass  of  a  smoky-greenish  hue, 
having  all  the  cracked  panes  carefully  puttied. 
The  shelves  contained  only  a  bare  change  of  dishes 
and  plates,  knives  and  forks  just  enough,  and  those 
odd  ones,  the  handles  of  which  had  undergone  a 
4  sea-change,'  from  a  gray  pea-green  tint  to  the 
yellow  tone  visible  in  an  overgrown  cucumber. 
No  Flanders-brick  was  ever  used  to  them,  a  piece 
of  true  English  was  preferred,  and  brought  to 
Bronze  from  Marylebone  Fields  by  her  master. 
Nor  was  the  sink  often  stopped  with  tea-leaves, 
since  they  were  carefully  saved  to  sprinkle  the  best 
carpet,  to  lay  the  dust,  before  it  was  swept.  The 
remainder  of  the  furniture  consisted  of  a  flat 
candlestick,  with  a  saveall ;  but  for  snuffers  Bronze 
used  her  scissors,  or  indeed,  upon  most  occasions, 
her  fingers.  Of  the  dining  and  sitting-parlour,  the 
description  will  be  familiar  to  many  of  the  most 
elegant,  witty,  and  noble  characters  of  the  country 
who  have  been  sitters  for  their  busts  to  Mr. 
Nollekens. 

That  which  we  will  call  the  dining,  sitting,  and 


308  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

sitters'  parlour,  was  the  corner  room,  which  had 
two  windows  looking  south,  the  entrance  to  it 
being  on  the  right  hand  in  the  passage  from  the 
street  door  in  Mortimer  Street.  The  visitors  will 
recollect  that  over  the  chimneypiece  there  was  a 
three-quarter  portrait  of  the  sculptor  himself,  with 
a  modelling-tool  in  his  hand,  leaning  with  his  right 
elbow  upon  the  bust  of  the  Hon.  Charles  James 
Fox,  the  execution  of  which  brought  him  both 
reputation  and  profit. 

The  artist's  modelling-stool  was  placed  near  the 
street-door  window,  and  the  sitter's  chair  nearer 
the  door,  whilst  facing  the  window  there  were 
several  small  models  of  Venus  upon  the  chimney- 
piece,  over  which,  and  under  his  own  portrait,  hung 
three  miniatures,  one  being  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds, 
by  Edridge,  taken  from  the  picture  in  the  club- 
room  in  the  Thatched  House  Tavern,  St.  James's 
Street.  The  other  two  were  of  Mrs.  Nollekens  and 
Miss  Welch,  painted  by  Smart,1  all  of  which  were 
presented  by  the  artists. 

Between  the  chimney  and  the  corner  window 
hung  two  beautiful  impressions,  one  of  Michael 
Angelo's  '  Last  Judgment,'  by  Martin  Rota,  and  the 
other,  Raffaelle's  '  St.  Cecilia,'  by  Marc-Antonio, 
both  from  the  Blackburn  Collection.  On  the 
closet-door  was  suspended  a  beautiful  picture  of 
flowers,  by  Deheim,  which  had  been  the  property 
of  Miss  Moser,  and  for  which  Mr.  Nollekens  said 
he  gave  her  forty  guineas  ;  and  nearer  the  window 
hung  a  drawing  of  Cupid  and  Psyche,'  by  Tresham, 

1  John  Smart,  the  elder  (1740-1811).— Ed. 


NOLLEKENS*  HOUSE  309 

with  another  portrait  of  Noliekens  drawn  by  Smart. 
This  drawing  is  now  in  the  possession  of  Mr. 
Taylor,  to  whom  Mr.  Noliekens  had  formerly 
promised  it. 

For  many  years  two  pieces  of  old  green  canvas 
were  festooned  at  the  lower  parts  of  the  windows 
for  blinds,  but  of  late  a  pretty  good  glass  was 
placed  against  the  pier.  On  the  west  side  of  the 
parlour,  from  the  window  to  the  north  of  the  room, 
hung  Mr.  Taylor's  drawing  of  Mr.  Pitt's  statue  in  a 
black  frame,  which  almost  destroyed  its  effect  ; 
and  over  it  were  two  pictures,  one  of  Nymphs,  by 
4  Old  Noliekens,'  the  other  was  of  a  dog,  by  Stubbs. 
Under  these  appeared  the  print  of  '  Three  Marys,' 
after  Carracci  ;  and  close  in  the  corner  by  the 
window  upon  a  bracket  was  placed  a  small  copy  of 
RafFaelle's  model  of  Jonah  ;  whilst  between  the 
door  and  the  north  end  was  a  small  picture  with 
sheep,  by  Bourgeois  ;  and  at  the  north  end,  also 
upon  a  bracket,  stood  a  small  copy  of  Michael 
Angelo's  figure  of  Moses.1 

On  the  north  side  of  the  room  hung  two  land- 
scapes, drawn  and  presented  by  Gainsborough  ;  two 
drawings  by  Zoffany,  also  presentations  ;  a  drawing 
by  Mr.  Taylor  of  Mr.  Noliekens'  monument  to  the 
memory  of  Mrs.  Howard,  of  Corby,  and  a  drawing 
from  Cipriani  were  suspended  against  the  door. 
Near  these  were  a  picture  of  flowers,  by  Mrs. 
Lloyd,  and  a  portrait  of  Mr.  Welch,  by  Brompton  ;2 

1  Casts  of  the  magnificent  originals  of  these  statues  are  now  ex- 
hibiting by  Mr.  Day  in  the  Egyptian  Hall,  Piccadilly. — Smith. 

2  Richard  Brompton,  portrait  painter  to  the  Empress  Catharine. 
He  died  in  St.  Petersburg  in  1782.— Ed. 


3io  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


beside  which  hung  Barry's  picture  of  '  The  Origin 
of  Music.'  On  each  side  of  the  chimney  was  a 
drawing  by  Paul  Sandby  ;  and  close  to  the  fire- 
place, though  rather  out  of  sight,  hung  two  bits  of 
slate  dangling  upon  a  nail,  on  which  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Nollekens  kept  their  separate  memoranda  of  the 
day's  expenditure,  for  they  kept  distinct  accounts 
against  each  other,  as  to  letters,  porters  employed, 
or  things  purchased  for  the  house,  etc.  Near  the 
corner  window  was  a  closet,  in  which  were  placed 
candles — though,  as  for  soap,  Bronze  declared  the 
house  had  never  known  any  for  forty  years — and  a 
few  preserves,  pickles,  or  other  little  presents  from 
persons  who  had  great  expectations.  Caleb  White- 
foord's  wine  also  found  a  safe  depository  in  this 
closet,  together  with  an  uncut  loaf,  or  a  bit  of  fresh 
butter,  a  little  scalded  milk,  a  paper  containing  the 
academic  nutmegs,  fragments  of  string,  and  old 
screws  and  nails,  which  were  picked  up  as  things 
that  might  be  wanted  some  time  or  other. 

The  drawing-room  contained  a  three-quarter 
portrait  of  Mrs.  Nollekens,  as  '  Innocence  with  a 
Dove,'  painted  by  her  friend  Angelica  Kauffmann  ; 
on  the  chimneypiece  were  several  models,  par- 
ticularly the  one  of  Mercury,1  for  which  I  was 
standing  when  Mr.  Taylor  smelt  the  leg  of  pork. 
There  were  also  three  landscapes  by  Wilson,  two 
of  which  had  been  painted  for  Mr.  Welch,  and 
came  to  Mrs.  Nollekens  at  the  death  of  her  sister  ; 
a  picture  by  West,  four  friezes  by  Bartolozzi,  after 

1  This  was  promised  me  by  Mr.  Nollekens  ;  however,  I  purchased 
it  at  the  sale  of  his  property. — Smith. 


MRS.  NOLLEKENS  GUINEAS  311 


Cipriani,  and  a  drawing  by  Clarisseau,  which  hung 
against  the  door.  This  room  was  decorated  with 
some  of  the  furniture  of  Mrs.  Nollekens'  mother. 

Mr.  Welch's  library,  which  also  descended  to 
Mrs.  Nollekens,  was  closely  locked  up  in  a  small 
back-room,  where  she  had  deposited  eleven  hundred 
guineas.  They  were  accumulated  after  the  one 
and  two  pound  notes  were  issued,  for  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens, not  trusting  in  the  safety  of  paper  currency, 
prevailed  upon  most  of  her  tenants  to  pay  her  in 
gold  ;  which  request  she  walked  all  the  way  to  Mr. 
Alderman  Combe's  brewhouse  to  make  as  to  the 
payment  for  a  house  rented  of  her  by  that  firm  in 
Drury  Lane.  These  guineas  she  would  look  over 
pretty  often,  and  weigh  in  her  hands  against  each 
other,  partly  from  the  enjoyment  she  felt  in 
counting  her  wealth,  and  partly  to  discover  if 
anyone  had  been  deceiving  her  with  coin  short 
of  weight.  Her  feeling  of  delight  in  this  occu- 
pation is  not  unhappily  expressed  in  the  following 
lines  : 

1  As  these  alternate  poising  in  each  hand, 
He  cries,  "  This  doth — no — no — this  weigheth  most 
By  half  a  grain  or  so  ;  and  half  a  grain 
Of  gold  is  something  worth — I'd  buy  me  scales, 
But  scales  cost  money  ;  so  I  must  do  without  'em." ' 

I  very  much  fear  that  Mr.  Nollekens  had  no 
innate  love  of  religion,  nor  ever  dedicated  much 
time  to  devotion.  He  was  a  Roman  Catholic 
because  his  father  had  died  in  that  faith  ;  but  his 
attendance  at  Warwick  Street  Chapel,  and  subse- 
quently at  the  one  in  Sutton  Street,  Soho  Square, 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


was  confined,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  to  fine  Sunday 
mornings  ;  his  regard  to  Christianity  on  a  rainy 
day  never  extended  beyond  his  own  threshold  ;  nor 
was  he,  according  to  Bronze's  assertion,  ever  known 
to  be  in  private  meditation.  He  now  and  then, 
however,  according  to  the  custom  of  an  observant 
Catholic,  received  visits  from  a  priest,  who  con- 
fessed him  and  gave  him  absolution.  He  was  never 
known  to  give  money  to  benefit  the  Roman  Church, 
but  at  times  he  has  certainly  been  seen  to  extend 
his  charity  to  a  mendicant  at  the  door  of  the  chapel, 
who  cunningly  moved  him  by  soliciting  alms  in  the 
name  of  St.  Francis,  the  favourite  saint  of  Antwerp, 
the  native  city  of  his  father. 

In  the  course  of  my  long  acquaintance  with  his 
pursuits  in  art,  I  never  saw  a  single  model  by  his 
hand  of  our  Saviour,  the  Virgin  Mary,  nor  even 
St.  Francis  ;  nor  do  I  believe,  during  his  long 
practice,  that  he  has  once  erected  a  monument  to 
which  the  cross  has  been  attached  ;  no  doubt  he 
would  have  been  employed  by  many  of  the  Catholic 
profession  had  he  applied  to  them  ;  though  perhaps 
it  was  owing  to  his  careless  inattention  to  his  duty 
that  those  of  his  own  persuasion  did  not  employ 
him.  Whenever  Mr.  Nollekens  spake  of  the  Bible, 
he  did  not  appear  to  have  a  general  knowledge  of 
its  contents,  nor  do  I  recollect  his  selecting  a  subject 
for  the  exercise  of  his  art  from  Holy  Writ  ;  and, 
even  farther,  I  never  once  heard  him  observe  that 
such  and  such  a  subject  would  model  well. 

How  different,  on  the  contrary,  was  the  pious  mind 
of  Flaxman  ;  for  though  he  was  passionately  fond 


WESTMINSTER  ABBEY  313 


of  Homer,  and  other  authors  never  noticed  by 
Nollekens,  he  was  never  more  delighted  than  when 
he  was  engaged  upon  sacred  subjects,  as  witness 
his  noble  designs  from  the  Lord's  Prayer  ;  for  how 
sweetly,  and,  I  was  going  to  say,  in  how  heavenly 
a  manner  he  has  treated  them  !  I  will  venture  to 
assert  boldly  in  the  face  of  the  unbeliever  who  may 
laugh  at  this  page,  that  if  our  churches  were 
decorated  with  sculptured  subjects  taken  from  the 
best  and  oldest  book  in  the  world,  their  religious 
sentiments  would  be  much  more  strongly  excited 
when  in  a  place  of  public  worship  than  by  the  filthy 
exhibition  of  General  Monk's  cap,  the  shoe-buckles 
worn  by  Lord  Nelson,  or  a  favourite  i  Poll  Parrot ' 
of  the  deceased  ladv,  '  modelled  '  as  the  showmen 
of  the  Abbey  are  pleased  to  tell  the  gaping  visitors, 
L  as  naturally  as  life  !' 

I  sincerely  hope,  however,  that  a  time  will  come 
when  Westminster  Abbey,  and  all  other  buildings 
dedicated  to  sacred  purposes,  will  be  cleared  of  such 
mummery  and  laid  open  to  the  free  inspection  of 
the  public,  who  may  walk  about  such  noble  edifices 
and  see  the  works  of  ancient  and  modern  art  with- 
out being  invited  to  pay  for  the  exhibition  of  wax- 
work and  models  of  churches  which  have  nothing 
whatever  to  do  with  the  edifice  itself  ;  indeed,  the 
former  were  better  destroyed,  and  the  models  pre- 
sented to  the  Society  of  Arts.  I  will  also  ask  the 
inquiring  reader  whether  it  be  fair  that  the  public 
should  be  obliged  to  pay  for  a  sight  of  those  monu- 
ments which  the  Government  has  so  liberally 
erected  to  perpetuate  the  memory  of  those  to  whom 


3i4  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

they  have  been  inscribed  ?  I  speak  as  an  artist, 
my  present  theme  being  principally  upon  works  of 
the  sculptors  of  them.  The  doors  should  be  opened 
for  certain  hours  daily,  so  that  the  public  might  see 
how  extensively  liberal,  particularly  of  late  years, 
the  nation  has  been  in  voting  monuments  to  the 
memory  of  men  of  departed  genius,  and  more 
especially  to  those  military  and  naval  victors  who 
have  so  nobly  shed  their  blood  and  fallen  in  their 
country's  service. 

To  view  the  Abbey  of  Westminster  unencum- 
bered of  its  waxen  effigies  would  be  a  gratification 
for  many  a  morning  ;  and  the  servants,  instead  of 
expecting  a  few  pence  for  their  own  pockets,  might 
still  be  employed  to  walk  about  to  see  that  no 
mischief  was  done  to  the  treasures  of  that  venerable 
structure.1  Surely  it  would  be  far  better  were  a 
man  to  be  thus  healthfully  exercised  than  to  shut 
him  up  in  a  small  recess  at  the  entrance  of  Poets' 
Corner,  where  now  the  contribution  is  demanded, 
and  where  he  closes  upon  the  visitor,  as  a  pair  of 
snuffers  top  the  wick  of  a  candle,  and  as  if  the 
money-taking  business,  according  to  the  custom  of 
a  playhouse,  was  to  be  looked  after  first.  Now,  I 
will  venture  to  say  that  a  regular  citizen  never  calls 
upon  anyone  for  payment  before  sight ;  nor  do  the 
servants  of  the  very  few  high  families  which  still 
suffer  their  domestics  to  take  money  expect  to 
receive  what  the  visitors  choose  to  give  them  before 

1  I  must,  however,  add  that  I  should  like  to  see  the  curious  old  iron- 
work put  up  again  which  inclosed  the  most  ancient  monuments  in  the 
Abbey. — Smith. 


CIVIC  GOSSIP  315 


they  are  attended  back  to  the  portal.  Again,  I  will 
ask  this  question,  How  far  is  the  London  investi- 
gator of  religious  structures  to  go  before  he  meets 
with  anything  to  be  compared  with  such  a  specimen 
of  sacred  architecture  as  Westminster  Abbey, 
mutilated  and  metamorphosed  as  it  has  been  ?  St. 
Albans  Abbey,  I  believe,  is  the  nearest  to  the 
Metropolis. 

When  Nollekens  once  had  occasion  to  visit  the 
Church  of  St.  Giles,  Cripplegate,  he  asked  me  to 
walk  with  him  ;  and  as  we  entered  Jewin  Street  we 
met  Sir  William  Staines,  who  informed  him  of 
his  having  been  chosen  Mayor,  and  that  he  should 
send  him  a  ticket  for  the  civic  dinner.  Nollekens: 
c  Dinner  !  bless  your  heart,  I'd  rather  dine  at  home ; 
you  citizens  make  such  a  noise,  and  I  get  my  clothes 
spoiled.  You've  seen  me  in  my  Pourpre  du  Pape, 
and  do  you  know,  that  at  our  last  Academy  dinner 
a  stupid  fool  spilt  the  butter-boat  upon  it  ?  Have 
you  any  comforts  in  your  pocket  ?  I've  got  such 
a  cold  !  Now,  pray  tell  me,  will  they  let  you 
smoke  your  pipe  in  the  Mayor's  coach  ?'  Staines : 
'  Bless  you  !  I  don't  mean  to  attempt  such  a  thing  ; 
but  when  I'm  in  my  private  carriage  they  can't 
hinder  me  ;  then  if  they  offer  it,  I'll  take  them  up  ! 
Have  you  bought  any  stone  lately  ?  I've  some  very 
close  Yorkshire.'  Nollekens :  c  No,  I  don't  want 
any.'  Staines :  '  Well,  then,  you  won't  dine  on  my 
day  ?'  Nollekens :  i  No  ;  but  I  suppose  my  friends, 
Sir  William  Beechey  and  Sir  Francis  Bourgeois, 
will  be  there.  Well,  good-bye  ;  I  am  going  into 
the    church.'     Staines:    'What,  into  our  church? 


316  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Stay,  I'll  save  you  a  shilling.  I'll  ring  the  bell  for 
Mrs.  Richardson,  the  sexton's  wife.  Oh,  here  she 
comes.  We  want  to  2:0  into  the  churchyard  ;  I 
want  to  show  my  wife's  tombstone  to  Mr.  Nollekens 
and  his  friend.'  Mrs.  Richardson :  '  Do  you  know, 
Sir  iWilliam,  there's  a  corner  off  ?'  '  Ay,  I  am 
sorry  for  it  ;  I  had  the  largest  I  could  get  for 
money,  and,  as  I  am  a  dealer  in  stone,  you  see,  I 
had  a  little  pride  about  me  on  that  occasion.' 
Nollekens :  c  What  a  thick  one  it  is  ! — why  did  you 
waste  so  much  stone  ?'  Staines :  '  That's  the 
reason  ;  I  was  determined  to  have  the  thickest  for 
its  size  that  ever  came  to  London  ;  it  measures 
nine  feet  eight  inches  in  length,  by  seven  feet  three 
inches  and  three-quarters  in  width.' 

I  was  present  one  morning  when  Mr.  West  was 
sitting  to  Nollekens  for  the  bust  which  the  British 
Institution  had  honoured  him  by  ordering  for  their 
gallery,  when,  among  other  anecdotes,  the  President 
related  the  following  of  Biagio  Rebecca,1  an  artist 
principally  employed  in  painting  staircases  and 
ceilings  with  allegorical  subjects  in  arabesque  decora- 
tions, formerly  much  in  fashion  in  England, 
Mortimer,  Cipriani,  Angelica  Kauffmann,  Zucchi 
Hamilton,  and  many  other  eminent  artists  being 
often  engaged  upon  such  works  :  George  III.  had 
commanded  Rebecca  to  adorn  some  of  the  royal 
apartments  at  Windsor,  during  which  employment 
his  Majesty,  with  his  usual  affability,  would  fre- 
quently converse  with  him  ;  but  in  such  conversa- 

1  Biagio  Rebecca  was  born  in  Italy  in  1735,  became  an  A.R.A.,  and 
died  without  further  promotion  in  1808. — Ed. 


B I  AGIO  REBECCA  317 


tions  the  artist,  who  was  not  a  little  conceited  of  his 
talents,  attempted  to  conduct  himself  in  the  presence 
of  his  Majesty  as  Verrio  did  before  Charles  II., 
being  so  silly  as  to  believe  that  his  conduct  would 
be  laughed  at  by  the  condescending  monarch.  In 
this,  however,  the  impudent  Kebecca  was  mistaken, 
for  whenever  he  was  guilty  of  the  slightest  im- 
propriety of  that  kind  the  King  never  failed  to 
mention  it  to  Mr.  West. 

One  day,  at  Windsor,  after  Rebecca  had  received 
a  considerable  sum  of  money,  he  proposed  to  share 
the  expense  of  a  postchaise  to  London  with  Mr. 
West  ;  and  just  as  they  reached  Hounslow  Heath 
the  King,  who  was  returning  to  Windsor,  looked 
into  their  chaise.  The  next  time  Mr.  West  was 
in  the  royal  presence,  the  King  asked  him  who  the 
foreign  nobleman  was  that  he  had  in  the  chaise 
with  him  the  last  time  they  met  on  Hounslow 
Heath.  Mr.  West  declared  Rebecca  was  his  only 
companion.  '  Oh  no,'  observed  his  Majesty  ;  c  it 
was  a  person  of  distinction.'  Mr.  West,  upon 
inquiry,  found  out  that  Rebecca,  who  expected 
to  meet  the  King,  and  knew  his  Majesty  to  be  near- 
sighted, had  the  impudence  to  fix  a  paper  star  on 
his  coat,  which  he  had  cut  out  for  the  purpose  of 
attracting  the  King's  notice,  supposing  that  he 
would  certainly  laugh  at  it  as  a  jest. 

Rebecca,  being  fully  aware  of  the  great  fondness 
people  in  general  have  for  money,  would,  in  what- 
ever company  he  was,  pass  his  jokes,  purposely  to 
amuse  the  frivolous  part  of  them,  and  the  following 
trick  in  particular  he  was  sure  to  practise  :  He  had 


3i8  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

prepared  a  drawing  in  imitation  of  a  half-crown 
piece,  which  he  would  unobservedly  place  upon  the 
floor,  and  then  laugh  immoderately  at  the  eager- 
ness with  which  even  a  gentleman  in  full  dress, 
with  his  sword  and  bag,  would  sometimes  run  and 
scuffle  to  pick  it  up. 

One  day  I  was  standing  with  Mr.  Nollekens  at 
his  gate  in  Titchfield  Street,  when  a  man,  with  full 
staring  eyes,  accosted  him  with  :  '  Well,  Mr.  Nolle- 
kens, how  do  you  do  ?  You  don't  remember  me  ; 
but  you  recollect  my  grandfather,  Arthur  Pond.'1 
'  Oh  yes,  very  well  ;  he  used  to  christen  old  draw- 
ings for  Hudson — ay,  I  have  often  seen  him  when  I 
was  a  boy.'  •  The  same,'  observed  the  stranger  ; 
4  my  name's  John,  commonly  Jack  ;  his  son,  my 
father,  was  a  livery- stable  keeper,2  and  so  Anthony 
Pasquin3  always  called  me  "  Horse  Pond."  Of 
this  man's  sister  there  is  a  mezzotinto  head,  nearly 
as  laro:e  as  nature,  drawn  and  engraved  from  the 
life    by    John    Spilsbury,    and   published    by   him 

1  The  painter  and  engraver  (1705-1758). — Ed. 

2  This  stable-keeper  was  the  compiler  of  the  ■  Racing  Calendar.' — 
Smith. 

3  Many  persons  know  that  Anthony  Pasquin's  real  name  was 
Williams,  but  I  believe  very  few  are  aware  that  he  had  been  articled 
to  learn  the  art  of  engraving  of  Matt.  Darley,  of  the  Strand,  the 
famous  caricaturist.  A  particular  friend  of  mine  has  a  set  of  coat- 
buttons,  upon  every  one  of  which  Anthony  engraved  a  boat,  as  the 
badge  of  a  member  of  a  club  entitled  '  The  Sons  of  Neptune,'  con- 
sisting of  youths  who  strictly  observed  the  Lord  Mayor's  rules  of 
Swan-Upping,  for  the  enjoyment  of  the  scenery  of  the  banks  of  Old 
Father  Thames,  confining  the  stretch  of  their  oars  from  Wapping  Old 
Stairs  to  the  Bush  at  Staines. — Smith.  'Anthony  Pasquin's '  name 
was  John  Williams.  He  was  a  pungent  critic  of  contemporary  art. 
He  died  in  the  United  States  in  1818.— Ed. 


EXCURSIONS  TO  UXBRIDGE  319 

December  I,  176G,  then  living  in  Russell  Court, 
Co  vent  Garden.  This  female  has  been  celebrated 
by  Dr.  Johnson,  in  his  '  Idler,'  as  the  lady  who  rode 
a  thousand  miles  in  a  thousand  hours.  I  have  a 
portrait  of  her  in  her  gray  hairs,  which  I  drew 
when  I  was  studying  the  various  expressions  of 
insane  people  in  Bethlem  Hospital,  of  which  insti- 
tution she  was  an  unfortunate  inmate.  An  engraver 
of  the  name  of  Smith  published  in  1787  a  quarto 
portrait  of  the  above  John  Pond,  who  being  notorious 
for  nothing  but  getting  drunk,  it  did  not  sell  ;  but 
in  order  to  make  it  answer  his  purpose,  he,  to  the 
great  annoyance  of  Dr.  Wolcot,  erased  the  name  of 
John  Pond,  and  substituted  that  of  Peter  Pindar, 
without  making  the  least  alteration  in  the  features 
or  person,  when  in  a  few  days  he  distributed  im- 
pressions in  the  shop-windows  all  over  the  town, 
and  many  a  portrait-collector  has  '  enriched '  his 
book  with  it,  as  the  true  and  lively  ef^gy  of  the 
man  who  cared  not  whose  character  he  traduced. 

I  ought  to  have  noticed  in  a  former  page  that, 
when  it  was  customary  for  so  much  company  to 
visit  Uxbridge  by  the  barges  drawn  by  horses1 
gaily  decked  out  with  ribands,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Nollekens,  with  all  the  gaiety  of  youthful  extrava- 
gance, embarked  on  board,  and  actually  dined  out 
on  that  gala-day  at  their  own  expense.  The  sights 
they  saw  on  this  memorable  aquatic  excursion 
afforded  them  mutual  conversation  for  several 
weeks  ;  and  Mrs.  Nollekens  actually  tired  her 
friends  with   letters  upon  their   canal   adventures 

1  The  Grand  Junction  Canal  was  opened  to  Uxbridge  in  1801  ? — Ed. 


320  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

from  Paddington  to  Uxbridge,  and  from  Uxbridge 
to  Paddington.  In  these  epistles  she  most  poetically 
expatiated  upon  the  clearness  of  the  water,  the 
fragrance  of  the  flowers,  the  nut-brown  tints  of  the 
wavy  corn,  and  the  ruddy  and  healthful  com- 
plexions of  the  cottagers'  children,  who  waited 
anxiously  to  see  the  vessel  approach  their  native 
shores.  The  only  fatigue  was  the  hasty  walk  from 
Mortimer  Street  to  Paddington,  and  the  loitering 
return  from  Paddington  to  Mortimer  Street,  where, 
soon  after  their  arrival,  they  refreshed  themselves 
with  an  additional  cup  of  tea,  and  for  that  evening 
indulged  in  going  to  bed  before  sunset. 

The  pleasures  of  a  similar  excursion  induced  the 
late  venerable  President  West  to  paint  a  picture  of 
the  barge  he  went  by,  on  the  crowded  deck  of  which 
he  has  introduced  his  own  portrait,  and  also  those 
of  several  of  his  friends  who  were  that  day  on 
board.  This  pleasing  and  singular  picture  adorns 
the  splendid  gallery  of  West's  works,  daily  exhibit- 
ing at  his  late  house  in  Newman  Street. 

These  excursions  to  Uxbridge  were,  like  many 
other  fashionable  entertainments,  soon  laid  aside. 
Air-balloons  were  also  formerly  much  sought  after  ; 
but  now  on  a  summer's  afternoon,  if  one  be 
announced,  few  people  will  turn  up  their  eyes  to 
look  at  it.  And  steamboats,  which  have  engaged 
the  thoughts  of  the  aquatic  travellers,  are  already 
talked  of  with  indifference,  since  a  steam  stage- 
coach1 is  about  to  start  without  horses. 

1  This  ran  several  times  from  Hyde  Park  Corner  to  Reading  and 
back,  but  did  not  prove  a  success. — Ed. 


RATS'  CASTLE 


One  May  morning,  during  Mrs.  Nollekens* 
absence  from  town,  Mrs.  Lobb,  an  elderly  lady,  in 
a  green  calash,  from  the  sign  of  the  Fan,  in  Dyot 
Street,  St.  Giles's,  was  announced  by  Kit  Finney, 
the  mason's  son,  as  wishing  to  see  Mr.  Nollekens. 
'  Tell  her  to  come  in,'  said  Nollekens,  concluding 
that  she  had  brought  him  a  fresh  subject  for  a 
model  just  arrived  from  the  country  ;  but  upon 
that  lady's  entering  the  studio,  she  vociferated 
before  all  his  people  :  4 1  am  determined  to  expose 
you,  I  am,  you  little  grub !'  c  Kit !'  cried  Nollekens, 
6  call  the  yard-bitch,'  adding,  with  a  clenched  fist, 
that  '  if  she  kicks  up  any  bobbery  here  I  will  send 
Lloyd  for  Lefuse,  the  constable.'  '  Ay,  ay,  honey  !* 
exclaimed  the  dame,  ;  that  won't  do.  It's  all  mighty 
fine  talking  in  your  own  shop.  I'll  tell  his  Worship 
Collins,  in  another  place,  what  a  scurvy  way  you 
behaved  to  young  Bet  Belmanno  yesterday !  Why, 
the  girl  is  hardly  able  to  move  a  limb  to-day.  To 
think  of  keeping  a  young  creature  eight  hours  in 
that  room,  without  a  thread  upon  her,  or  a  morsel 
of  anything  to  eat  or  a  drop  to  drink,  and  then  to 
give  her  only  two  shillings  to  bring  home !  Neither 
Mr.  Fuseli  nor  Mr.  Tresham  would  have  served  me 
so.  How  do  you  think  I  can  live  and  pay  the 
income-tax  ?  Never  let  me  catch  you  or  your  dog 
beating  our  rounds  again  ;  if  you  do,  I'll  have  you 
both  skinned  and  hung  up  in  Rats'  Castle.1     Who 

1  '  Rats'  Castle,'  a  shattered  house  then  standing  on  the  east  side  of 
Dyot  Street,  and  so  called  from  the  rat-catchers  and  canine  snackers 
who  inhabited  it,  and  where  they  cleaned  the  skins  of  those  un- 
fortunate stray  dogs  who  had  suffered  death  the  preceding  night. — 
Smith. 

21 


322  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


do  you  laugh  at  ?'  she  continued,  at  the  same  time 
advancing  towards  him.  c  I  have  a  great  mind  to 
break  all  your  gashly  images  about  the  head  of 
your  fine  miss,  in  her  silks  and  satins  ' — mistaking 
his  lay-figure  for  a  living  model  of  the  highest 
sort.  '  I  suppose  you  pay  my  lady  well  enough, 
and  pamper  her  besides  !' 

Nollekens,  perceiving  Mrs.  Lobb's  rage  to 
increase,  for  the  first  time,  perhaps,  drew  his  purse- 
strings  willingly,  and,  putting  shilling  after  shilling 
into  her  hand,  counted  four  and  then  stopped. 
4  No,  no,'  said  she  ;  '  if  you  don't  give  me  t'other 
shilling,  believe  me,  I  don't  budge  an  inch!'1  This 
he  did  ;  and  Kit,  after  closing  the  gates,  received 
peremptory  orders  from  his  master  to  keep  them 
locked  for  three  or  four  days  at  least,  for  fear  of  a 
second  attack. 

Soon  after  I  had  the  honour  of  being  appointed 
Keeper  of  the  Prints  and  Drawings  in  the  British 
Museum,  Mr.  Nollekens,  accompanied  by  Mr. 
Gibson  and  Mr.  Bonomi,  the  sculptors,  came  to 
visit  me.  Upon  my  being  apprised  of  my  old 
friend's  arrival  in  the  gallery  I  went  to  meet  him, 
in  order  to  see  that  he  had  a  chair,  as  he  was  then 
very  feeble.  I  remember,  when  he  was  seated  in 
the  middle  of  the  Elgin  Room,  he  put  the  following 
question  to  the  late  Mr.  Combe,  loud  enough  to  be 
heard  by  everyone  present  who  approached  to  see 
him  :  '  Why  did  not  you  bring  the  iEgina  marbles 
with  you,  they  are  more  clever  than  the  Phygalian 

1  Mrs.  Lobb  succeeded  the  notorious  Dame  Phillips,  formerly  of 
the  sign  of  the  Fau,  in  Orange  Court. — Smith. 


A    VISIT  FROM  NOLLEKENS  323 

marbles  ?  How  could  you  be  so  stupid  as  to 
miss  them  ?' 

Mr.  Combe,  thinking  to  divert  him  from  the 
subject,  said  :  '  I  thought  you  wore  hair-powder, 
sir  ?  I  continue  to  wear  hair-powder,  and  always 
use  the  best  I  can  get.'  Mr.  Nollekens,  not  hearing 
him,  repeated  nearly  the  same  question  in  a  louder 
voice  :  '  I  say,  why  did  you  let  them  go  ?'  For- 
tunately for  Mr.  Combe,  however,  he  was  sent 
for,  and  so  escaped  a  further  interrogation.  Mr. 
Nollekens  then  walked  up  to  No.  64,  the  fragment 
of  a  male  figure,  and  exclaimed  :  f  There,  you  see, 
look  at  that  shoulder  and  a  part  of  the  breast,  look 
at  the  veins !  The  ancients  did  put  veins  to  their 
gods,  though  my  old  friend,  Gavin  Hamilton, 
would  have  it  they  never  did.' 

When  he  was  as;ain  descending  to  the  Townlev 
Gallery,  he  stopped  at  the  first  flight  of  steps,  and, 
taking  hold  of  a  button  of  my  coat,  desired  me  to 
go  and  stand  there,  adding,  'Now  you  stand  where 
Queen  Charlotte  sot  when  she  came  to  see  the 
Museum.  She  was  very  tired  ;  they  brought  her  a 
chair,  and  I  stood  upon  the  steps  below.' 

As  we  were  passing  along  the  gallery,  he  said  : 
'Ay,  I  remember  seeing  the  tears  fall  down  the 
cheeks  of  Mr.  John  Townley  when  the  Parliament 
said  they  would  buy  the  marbles.  He  didn't  wish 
'em  to  take  'em ;  and  he  said  to  me,  "Mr.  Nollekens, 
if  Government  don't  take  my  nephew's  marbles, 
I'll  send  'em  down  to  Townley  Hall,  and  make  a 
grand  show  with  'em  there."  Poor  man,  I  never 
shall   forget  how   forlorn  he  looked.'      When   we 


324  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

arrived    at    the    terra- cotta   room,    he    exclaimed, 
looking  up  :  '  How  white  these  things  are  getting ! 
Now,  I  dare  say  they  put  'em  into  the  wall  with 
wet  plaster  ;  they  should  have  put  'em  in  with  what 
Mr.  Townley  used  to  call  bitumen,  and  then  they 
won't  moulder.     Well,  make  my  compliments  to 
Mr.  Planta  ;  I've  remembered  him,  and  so  I  have 
Combe,  though  he  did  let  the  marbles  slip  through 
his  fingers,  and  so  I  have  you,  Tom.     Well,  good- 
bye !     This  Museum  will  be  a  fine  place  very  soon.* 
c  Ay,  sir,'  observed  I,  '  suppose  you  were  to  leave 
us  your  fine  heads   of  Commodus  and  Mercury  f 
to    which    he    answered,    '  Well,    perhaps   I    may. 
Townley  wanted  'em  very  much,  but  I  could  not 
get  my  price.     He  sent  to  me  about  'em  just  before 
he  died.' 

To  continue  these  recollections  of  Mr.  Nollekens 
at  this  period,  I  shall  present  my  readers  with  a 
few  more  anecdotes  communicated  to  me  bv 
friends. 

The  late  Mr.  Garrard,1  the  Associate  of  the 
Royal  Academy,  said  to  Nollekens :  '  Well,  they 
tell  me  I  shall  be  elected  an  R.A.'  Nollekens  t 
4  Indeed !  why  you've  told  me  that  these  seven 
years.'  When  Garrard  had  taken  his  leave,  a 
friend  present  observed  :  '  He's  a  sculptor  as  well 
as  a  painter.'  Nollekens:  'Yes,  he  paints  better 
than  he  sculps.  He's  jack-of -all-trades  ;  the  rest 
we'll  leave  out.' 

1  George  Garrard,  born  1760  ;  elected  an  A.R.A.  in  1802  ;  died 
1826,  without  having  been  promoted  to  the  R.A.-ship.  He  was  an 
animal  painter  and  sculptor. — Ed. 


THE  BLUNTNESS  OF  NOLLEKENS  325 

A  lady,  with  her  three  daughters,  once  visited 
Mr.  Nollekens  to  show  him  the  drawings  of  her 
youngest,  who  was  a  natural  genius.  Upon  his 
looking  at  them,  he  advised  her  to  have  a  regular 
drawing- master.  ;  And  I  can  recommend  you  one,' 
added  he  ;  c  he  only  lives  over  the  way,  and  his 
name  is  John  Varley.'1  The  lady  asked  him  if  he 
were  a  man  of  mind.  4  Oh  yes !'  said  Nollekens, 
'  he's  a  clever  fellow ;  one  of  our  best.  I'll  ring 
the  bell,  and  send  my  maid  for  him  ;  he'll  soon  tell 
you  his  mind,'  so  ignorant  was  our  sculptor  of  the 
lady's  meaning. 

Whenever  he  was  in  Chelsea  with  a  friend,  he 
was  always  pleased  in  pointing  out  the  house  in 
which  his  mother  lived  after  her  marriage  with 
Williams,  saying  that  '  when  he  took  leave  of  her 
at  the  street-door  upon  his  going  to  Rome,  she  said 
to  him,  "  There,  Joey,  take  that  ;  you  may  want  it 
when  you  are  abroad."  It  was  a  housewife,  con- 
taining needles,  a  bodkin,  and  thread  ;  and,  do  you 
know,'  added  he,  ;  it  was  the  most  useful  thing  she 
could  have  given  me,  for  it  lasted  all  the  time 
I  was  at  Rome  to  mend  my  clothes  with  ;  ay,  and 
I  have  got  that  very  housewife  by  me  now  ; 
and,  do  you  know,  I  would  not  take  any  money 
for  it.' 

Desenfans,  the  famous  dealer  in  old  pictures, 
whose  remains  rest  in  a  splendid  mausoleum  at 
Dulwich,  erected  after  a  design  by  Soane,  was 
originally  a  dealer  in  Brussels  lace  and  a  teacher  of 
the  French  language. 

1  Astrologer  and  water-colour  painter  (1778-1842). — Ed. 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


A  lady,  however,  one  of  his  pupils,  possessed  of 
£5,000,  fell  so  desperately  in  love  with  him  that 
she  soon  after  married  him.  During  their  honey- 
moon they,  like  most  people  in  a  similar  situation, 
drove  into  the  country  for  a  little  recreation,  and 
there  at  an  auction  he  purchased  a  few  old  pictures, 
which,  on  his  return  to  London,  he  sold  to  such 
advantage  that  he  considered  it  his  interest  to  follow 
up  the  trade.  By  great  industry  and  a  little  taste 
he  at  length  amassed  so  considerable  a  sum  that  he 
finally  was  enabled  to  form  a  much  better  collection, 
which  he  left  to  his  protege,  Sir  Francis  Bourgeois, 
who,  at  the  suggestion  of  the  late  John  Kemble, 
left  it  to  Dulwich  College,  merely  because  that 
institution  had  been  founded  by  an  actor. 

I  mention  these  particulars  because  Nollekens 
told  my  worthy  friend  Arnald  that  he  and  a  friend 
went  halves  in  purchasing  a  picture  by  Pordenone, 
for  which  he  gave  £11  5s.,  and  which  they  speedily 
sold  to  Desenfans  for  £30.  In  these  brokering 
bargains  Nollekens  often  showed  considerable 
cunning,  for  he  would,  to  my  knowledge,  seldom 
speculate  without  a  partner. 

I  receive  infinite  pleasure  whenever  an  oppor- 
tunity presents  itself  in  which  I  can  exhibit  the 
conduct  of  my  old  friend  Mr.  Nollekens  to  advan- 
tage ;  and  I  must  do  him  the  justice  to  prove  his 
attachment  to  modern  art,  by  mentioning  the 
purchases  which  he  made  at  various  times,  and 
which  will  clearly  evince  his  general  inclination 
towards  his  brother  artists.  He  would  certainly 
have  more  extensively  indulged  in  these  purchases 


COLLECTION  OF  ENGRA  VINGS  327 

had  not  Mrs.  Nollekens  checked  his  liberality.  I 
remember  his  giving  £90  for  a  small  picture  by 
West  ;  and  that  he  also  purchased  at  Barry's 
auction  '  The  Origin  of  Music,'  a  small  specimen, 
but  one  of  that  artist's  most  interesting  designs, 
and  a  remarkably  good  piece  of  colouring  for  him. 
It  was  bought  at  Nollekens'  sale  by  the  Earl  of 
Egremont,  one  of  the  many  noblemen  who,  upon  all 
occasions,  contribute  liberally  to  the  encouragement 
of  modern  art. 

Nollekens  had  likewise  a  fine  collection  of  the 
engravings  from  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds'  pictures,  in 
which  he  took  great  delight,  and  was  never  better 
pleased  than  when  he  could  add  to  their  number. 
Some  persons  have  said  that  many  of  them  were 
presented  to  him  by  those  mezzotinto  engravers 
who  were  looking  after  Associates'  places  in  the 
Academy  ;  but,  be  this  as  it  might,  I  never  knew 
him  to  ask  an  engraver  for  a  print.  He  certainly 
accepted  impressions  from  the  owners  of  private 
plates  ;  and  the  Earl  of  Essex,  who  is  in  possession 
of  a  choice  collection  of  impressions  after  Sir 
Joshua,  gave  him  one  which  had  been  engraved  at 
the  expense  of  his  lordship  purposely  to  present  to 
his  friends. 

It  is  very  remarkable  that  many  of  our  eminent 
characters,  and  it  possibly  may  be  so  with  those 
of  other  nations,  sometimes  glaringly  expose  them- 
selves by  descending  to  the  most  frivolous  mean- 
nesses ;  particularly  in  preserving  every  insignificant 
article,  which  gratification  as  often  excites  astonish- 
ment in  their  friends  as  it  exposes  them  to  the  un- 


/ 


328  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

reflecting  remarks  of  their  enemies,  who  illiberally 
report  such  anecdotes  without  making  the  least 
allowance  for  the  odd  compound  of  ingredients  of 
which  the  human  mind  is  in  general  composed. 

As  corroborations  of  these  imbecilities,  I  shall 
venture  to  give  four  instances,  the  first  two  of 
which  the  reader  will  not  so  much  wonder  at,  as 
they  certainly  are  related  of  persons  of  weak 
intellect,  though  standing  on  eminent  ground  as 
artists  ;  but  he  will  be  surprised  at  the  two  latter, 
as  they  relate  to  sensible  men  who  have  shone 
in  society,  and  of  the  first  talents,  perhaps,  in 
their  respective  classes  which  this  country  has 
produced. 

Nollekens,  who  was  born  to  shine  as  one  of  our 
brightest  stars  as  a  bust-modeller,  whilst  he  was 
forming  the  beautiful  bosom  of  Lady  Charlemont, 
suddenly  left  her  ladyship  to  desire  the  helper  in 
the  yard  not  to  give  the  dog  more  than  half  the 
paunch  that  day,  observing  that  the  rest  would 
serve  him  to-morrow,  as  Mr.  John  Townley  had 
given  him  the  greatest  part  of  a  French  roll  that 
very  morning. 

Nollekens,  however,  I  firmly  believe,  had  no  idea 
whatever  of  making  himself  noticed  by  singularities. 
His  actions  were  all  of  the  simplest  nature  ;  and  he 
cared  not  what  he  said  or  did  before  anyone,  how- 
ever high  might  be  their  station  in  life.  He  so 
shocked  the  whole  of  a  large  party  one  night  at 
Lady  Beechey's  that  several  gentlemen  complained 
of  his  conduct,  to  which  Sir  William  could  only 
reply,  '  Why,  it  is  Nollekens,  the  sculptor  !' 


ABRAHAM  PETHER  329 


When  Abraham  Pether,1  the  painter  of  the  cele- 
brated picture  of  c  The  Harvest  Moon,'  employed 
himself  a  whole  day  to  make  his  wife  a  dust-shovel, 
he  was  so  indiscreet,  though  he  at  that  time  stood 
in  need  of  purchasers,  as  to  refuse  the  admittance 
of  two  gentlemen  who  walked  from  London  to 
Chelsea  with  the  full  determination  to  bespeak 
pictures  of  him.  The  painter,  however,  after  he 
had  whistled  through  a  dozen  new  tunes  and  smoked 
as  many  pipes,  at  length  finished  his  task,  and  re- 
marked to  a  friend,  '  There,  my  boy,  if  you  were 
to  give  half-a-crown  for  a  dust- shovel,  I  will  be 
bound  to  say  you  could  not  get  a  better.' 

Abraham  Pether  was  one  of  those  silly  beings 
who  endeavour  to  gain  popularity  by  being  called 
eccentric  ;  and,  amongst  others,  he  often  practised 
the  following  trick  :  He  would  knock  at  a  friend's 
door,  and  when  the  servant  opened  it,  he  was  dis- 
covered striking  a  light  to  set  fire  to  his  pipe,  and 
then  when  he  had  accomplished  his  task,  he  would 
walk  in  whiffing  his  tobacco. 

It  is  reported  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  that  one 
day,  when  the  knight  was  looking  about  the  house 
for  old  canvases,  he  found  a  mop-stick  put  up  in 
the  corner  of  the  back-kitchen,  and  that  he  strictly 
charged  Ralph  to  see  to  its  preservation,  in  order 
that  its  value  might  be  deducted  when  the  next 
new  mop  was  purchased.  Who  could  imagine  such 
a  charge  to  proceed  from  the  author  of  his  noble 
Lectures,  and  the  artist  who  painted  the  glorious 
pictures  of  l  Ugolino '  at  Knowle,  '  The  Infant 
1  1756-1812.— Ed. 


33o  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TLMES 

Hercules '  at  Petersburg,  and  Mrs.  Siddons  as  the 
;  Tragic  Muse'  at  Lord  Grosvenor's  ?  Sir  Joshua 
Reynolds  was  an  elegant  man,  and  admired  for  the 
mildness  of  his  manners. 

It  has  been  asserted  also  that  Pope,  when  engaged 
in  writing  some  of  his  most  elegant  works,  would 
leave  off  to  cook  lampreys,  in  a  silver  saucepan, 
over  his  own  fire.  Pope  piqued  himself  upon  the 
high  birth  of  those  with  whom  he  associated. 

Nollekens,  who  was  at  one  time  passionately  fond 
of  seeing  the  soldiers  relieve  guard,  was  accosted 
one  Sunday  morning,  when  bustling  down  the  Hay- 
market  with  his  little  protege  Joseph  towards  the 
Parade,  by  a  little  girl,  who  supplicated  him  to  ring 
an  upper  bell.  '  Ring  a  bell,  ring  a  bell,  my  pretty 
little  maid,  that  I  will  ;'  but  he  could  not  accom- 
plish it.  A  Lifeguardsman,  well  knowing  the 
advantage  of  a  few  inches,  coming  down  the  street 
and  seeing  Nollekens  on  tip-toe,  straining  himself 
to  enjoy  his  favourite  amusement  of  bell-pulling, 
raised  his  arm  at  a  riffht-anffle  from  his  bodv,  and 
pulled  the  bell  with  the  greatest  ease,  to  the  great 
surprise  of  Nollekens  and  the  joy  of  the  child,  who 
had  been  squeezed  by  the  crescent,  tip -toe  position 
of  Nollekens  against  the  door-post.  This  scene 
would  be  a  good  one  for  the  spirited  pencil  of 
Cruikshank,  and  it  might  be  called  the  '  Advantage 
of  Greatness.' 

Mr.  Nollekens,  when  modelling  the  bust  of  a 
lady  of  high  fashion,  requested  her  to  lower  her 
handkerchief  in  front  ;  the  lady  objected,  and  ob- 
served :  c  I  am  sure,  Mr.  Nollekens,  you  must  be 


BEHAVIOUR  TOWARDS  THE  QUALITY  331 

sufficiently  acquainted  with  the  general  form  ;  there- 
fore, there  can  be  no  necessity  for  my  complying 
with  your  wish  ;'  upon  which  Nollekens  muttered 
that  c  there  was  no  bosom  worth  looking  at  beyond 
the  age  of  eighteen.' 

Lady  Arden  had  once  been  waiting  some  time  in 
the  parlour  for  Mr.  Nollekens,  who  had  the  decency 
to  attempt  an  apology,  by  assuring  her  ladyship 
{ that  he  could  not  come  up  before,  for  that  he  had 
been  downstairs  washing  his  feet ;'  further  adding 
that  they  were  '  now  quite  comfortable.' 

Nollekens  being  once  in  expectation  of  a  very 
high  personage  to  visit  his  studio,  was  dressed  to 
receive  him  ;  and  after  walking  up  and  down  the 
passage  for  nearly  an  hour,  being  deprived  of  the 
advantage  of  using  his  clay  for  fear  of  spoiling  his 
clothes,  he  at  length  heard  the  equipage  arrive. 
According  to  his  usual  custom,  he  opened  the  street- 
door,  and  as  the  illustrious  visitor  alighted  he  cried 
out :  '  So  you're  come  at  last  !  Why,  you  are  an 
hour  beyond  your  time  ;  you  would  not  have  found 
me  at  home  if  I  had  had  anywhere  to  have  gone  to, 
I  assure  you  !' 

One  day,  when  Lady  Newborough,  who  was  a 
great  favourite  with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nollekens,  was 
invited  to  dinner,  they  sent,  just  before  they  were 
about  to  sit  down,  to  Taylor  to  make  up  the  party  ; 
Taylor's  spirit,  however,  would  not  allow  him  to 
accept  of  so  short  a  notice,  and  he  preferred  dining 
at  home.  The  next  day  Mrs.  Nollekens  expressed 
her  sorrow  that  she  had  not  the  pleasure  of  his 
company,   stating  that   they   had   a  venison  pasty 


332  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


which  she  could  not  eat,  at  the  same  time  blabbing 
that  the  preceding  week  they  had  had  a  fine  haunch, 
of  which  she  was  very  fond,  and,  indeed,  never 
tired. 

When  Tuppin,  a  carpenter,  received  orders  for  a 
packing-case,  he  was  always  obliged  to  state  pre 
cisely  what  it  would  amount  to,  and  then  Mr. 
Xollekens  would  strengthen  the  bargain  by  insisting 
upon  it  being  sent  home  well  stuffed  with  shavings ; 
but  these  he  never  suffered  the  servants  to  have  at 
their  mercy  ;  they  were  locked  up  in  a  place  called 
a  wine-cellar,  and  given  out  by  himself  the  night 
before  they  were  wanted  for  morning  use. 

In  some  instances,  however,  Mr.  Nollekens  was, 
according  to  the  old  adage,  '  penny  wise  and  pound 
foolish';  and  this  was  particularly  the  case  as  to 
sweeping  his  chimneys,  since  he  thought  that  many 
persons  had  them  swept  too  often.  However,  after 
having  been  several  times  annoyed  by  the  fire- 
engines  and  their  regular  attendants — the  mob — he 
was  determined  to  have  them  more  frequently 
cleaned,  though  some  of  them,  for  the  want  of  fires, 
yielded  no  soot.  He  nevertheless  consoled  himself 
for  this  increased  expenditure  by  discovering  that 
such  a  practice  kept  up  the  fame  of  a  consumption 
of  coals,  like  one  of  the  masters  of  Gil  Bias,  who 
always  picked  his  teeth  after  the  dinner-hour,  to 
induce  his  neighbours  to  believe  he  had  dined. 

Mr.  Nollekens  once  showed  Mr.  Gahagan  a  sketch 
in  charcoal  which  he  had  made  of  Mrs.  Palmer 
attending  her  daughter,  who  had  been  ill  for  a  con- 
siderable time,  having  drawn  the  young  lady  with 


EATABLES  333 


a  book  in  her  hand  which  she  had  been  reading. 
The  sculptor,  however,  smeared  out  the  book,  ob- 
serving to  Grahagan  :  '  She  is  getting  better  now  ; 
she  shan't  have  a  book.' 

The  most  insignificant  eatable  offered  to  him  by 
the  poorest  of  his  labourers  he  would  not  only 
accept  and  eat,  but  was  sure  to  make  some  observa- 
tion upon  it.  I  recollect  a  stone-polisher,  of  the 
name  of  Lloyd,  giving  him  a  cheese-cake,  and 
Nollekens,  after  asking  him  where  he  had  bought 
it,  observed  that  the  Kensington  cheese-cakes,  and 
those  made  at  Birch's  in  Cornhill,  Mrs.  Nollekens 
allowed  to  be  the  best.  Whenever  my  friend,  Mr. 
John  Kenton,  the  portrait-painter,  presented  a  melon 
to  Mr.  Nollekens,  he  always  observed  :  '  This  I  like  ; 
it  puts  me  so  much  in  mind  of  Kome.' 

Mr.  Deville,  well  known  for  his  fine  phrenological 
collection  of  busts,  etc.,  when  a  young  man  was 
employed  by  Mr.  Nollekens  to  make  casts  from 
moulds  which  required  oil,  upon  which  he  produced 
a  little,  saying :  '  There,  you'll  find  that  to  be  more 
than  enough.'  Deville,  having  poured  it  out  into  a 
shallow  basin,  declared  it  to  be  insufficient.  '  I 
don't  wonder  at  that,'  replied  Nollekens  snappishly  ; 
1  why  did  you  not  ask  me  for  a  wine-glass  ?  You've 
wasted  half  of  it  on  the  broad  bottom  of  the  basin !' 


[334] 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  insensibility  to  ancient  art  and  liberality  to  modern 
artists — Stewart's  picture  of  Washington — Further  instances  of  Mr. 
Nollekens'  eccentricities  and  manners — His  intended  bequest  to  the 
Royal  Academy — Condescension  of  the  Princess  of  Wales  to  him — 
Bantering  letters— Conduct  of  Sir  F.  Bourgeois — Mr.  Nollekens' 
man  Dodimy — Moses  Kean — Nollekens'  summons  to  his  tenants 
for  rent — His  household  economy  and  habits — His  custom  when 
Visitor  at  the  Royal  Academy — Caprice  of  his  charities — Lord 
Mansfield's  benevolence  —  Mr.  Wivell  —  Nollekens'  love  of  news- 
papers, and  memoranda  of  remarkable  events — Unfeeling  treat- 
ment of  his  model — Other  anecdotes  of  his  domestic  arrangements, 
art,  and  liberality — Frivolous  presents,  etc.,  sent  him  towards  the 
close  of  his  life  —  Beauty  of  foliated  ornaments  in  sculpture — 
Inferiority  of  architecture  to  sculpture  and  painting. 

My  friend,  Mr.  Robertson,1  the  justly -admired 
miniature-painter,  upon  receiving  an  exquisitely 
beautiful  picture  by  Ratfaelle,  consigned  to  him  by 
Mr.  Trumbold,  invited  Mr.  Nollekens,  among  many 
other  artists  of  eminence,  to  see  it  ;  but,  with  all 
its  excellence,  it  appeared  to  make  no  impression 
upon  him  whatever,  and  the  only  observation  he 
made  upon  leaving  the  house  was  :  '  Well,  as  you 
are  pleased  with  it,  I  am  glad  you  have  got  it.' 

1  Andrew  Robertson,  of  Aberdeen  (1777-1845),  who  became  the 
doyen  of  the  English  miniaturists. — Ed. 


LIBERALITY  OF  NOLLEKENS  335 


Insensible,  however,  as  Nollekens  generally  was 
when  looking:  at  works  of  ancient  art,  I  must  do 
him  the  justice  to  say  that  in  no  instance,  excepting 
when  speaking  of  Flaxman,  have  I  known  him 
attempt  to  depreciate  the  productions  of  modern 
artists  ;  on  the  contrary,  I  have  frequently  heard 
him  say,  when  he  has  been  solicited  to  model  a 
bust,  c  Gro  to  Chantrey  ;  he's  the  man  for  a  busto ! 
He'll  make  a  good  busto  of  you  ;  I  always  recom- 
mend him.'  I  have  also  known  him  to  give  an 
artist,  who  could  not  afford  to  purchase  it,  a  lump 
of  stone,  to  enable  him  to  execute  an  order,  though, 
at  the  same  time,  I  have  seen  him  throw  himself 
into  a  violent  passion  with  a  favourite  cat  for 
biting  the  feather  of  an  old  pen,  with  which  he  had 
for  many  years  oiled  the  hinges  of  his  gates  when- 
ever they  creaked.  I  can  almost  imagine  I  see 
him  now  standing  before  the  cat,  with  the  pen  in 
his  hand,  actually  showing  her  what  mischief  she 
had  done,  with  as  much  gravity  as  a  certain  stupid 
sheriff  manifested  when  he  was  counting  the  horse- 
shoe nails,  or  chopping  his  finger  instead  of  the 
stick  in  the  Court  of  Exchequer,  when  he  was 
sworn  into  office  by  the  Lord  Chief  Baron. 

Mr.  Nollekens  once  called  out  across  the  street 
to  me,  on  the  opposite  side  of  Hay  Hill  :  c  Smith, 
Peter  Coxe  has  just  knocked  down  General 
Washington,  Stewart's  picture.  Well,  what  do  you 
think  ?  It  fetched  a  great  deal  more  than  any 
modern  picture  ever  brought  by  auction  before,  for 
he  has  just  sold  it  at  Lord  Lansdowne's  for 
£540  15s.!     You  know  Stewart  :  he  was  born  in 


536  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

America,  He  painted  that  fine  portrait  of  Caleb 
Whitefoord.  He's  a  very  clever  fellow  ;  jnst  as 
clever  as  Dance — I  mean,  Sir  Nathaniel  Dance 
Holland.' 

One  evening,  Bronze  happening  to  place  the  tea- 
kettle over  the  fire,  Nollekens  immediately  cried 
out :  '  You  careless  devil,  you  don't  care  for 
the  work  you'll  have  in  the  morning  to  get  it 
clean!'  And  when  she  left  the  room  he  angrily 
muttered,  '  Extravagant  creature,  burning  out  the 
kettle !' 

Mr.  Nollekens,  when  he  dined  out  of  late  years, 
always  over-ate  himself,  particularly  with  the  pastry 
and  dessert.  However,  he  contrived  to  purloin  a 
small  quantity  of  sweetmeats  from  the  table,  which 
he  carried  to  Bronze,  saying  :  c  There,  Betty,  you 
see  what  I  have  brought  you  home  ;  I  don't  forget 
you.' 

When  he  was  showing  Mr.  Rossi,  the  Academi- 
cian, his  design  for  a  monument  to  the  memory  of 
the  late  Mrs.  Coke,  of  Norfolk,  Mrs.  Nollekens, 
being  the  latest  up  that  morning,  came  into  the 
room,  and  immediately  walked  up  to  her  husband, 
and  then,  after  making  a  stately  curtsey,  with  her 
accustomed  precision  of  pronunciation  said  :  '  Sir, 
your  watch.  My  dear  father  never  left  his  watch 
about.' 

When  Mr.  Jackson  was  once  making  a  drawing 
of  a  monument  at  the  sculptor's  house,  Nollekens 
came  into  the  room  and  said :  4  I'm  afraid  you're 
cold  here.'  '  I  am,  indeed,'  said  Jackson.  '  Ay,' 
answered  the  sculptor,  '  I  don't  wonder  at  it.    Why, 


MISS  GERRARD  337 


do  you  know,  there  has  not  been  a  lire  in  this  room 
for  these  forty  years !' 

The  same  artist  having  asked  him  what  he  meant 
to  exhibit  at  the  Eoyal  Academy,  Nollekens 
answered  :  i  Oh,  nothing  ;  I  be  done  now!'  c  Well,' 
replied  the  painter,  c  but  you  should  send  some- 
thing to  add  to  our  display  of  sculpture  ;'  but  his 
reply  was  still  a  selfish  one  :  '  No  ;  I  be  done.'  For 
he  had  no  idea  of  sending  anything  simply  for  the 
advantage  of  the  establishment,  of  which  he  was 
so  old  a  member,  although  at  one  period  of  his  life 
he  told  me  that  he  had  left,  in  one  of  his  wills,  the 
sum  of  £100,000,  to  enable  that  highly  respectable 
body  to  erect  a  new  Academy. 

Miss  Grerrard,  the  daughter  of  the  auctioneer, 
who  received  a  legacy  of  £19  19s.  after  Mrs. 
Nollekens'  death,  frequently  called  to  know  how  he 
did,  and  once  the  sculptor  pressed  her  to  dine  with 
him,  to  which  she  at  last  consented.  '  Well,  then,' 
said  he  to  his  pupil,  Joseph  Bonomi,  '  go  and  order 
a  mackerel.  Stay,  one  won't  be  enough  ;  you  had 
better  get  two,  and  you  shall  dine  with  us!'  It 
must  here  be  observed  that  his  two  servants  were 
now  on  board-wa^es. 


During  the  time  Mr.  Nollekens  was  modelling 
the  bust  of  the  Princess  of  Wales  at  Blackheath, 
her  Boyal  Highness,  upon  seeing  his  ear  filled  with 
powder,  observed :  4  Mr.  Nollekens,  your  hair- 
dresser has  left  some  powder  in  your  ear  ;  it  will 
make  you  deaf ;'  and  immediately  leaving  her 
chair,  she  took  up  a  handkerchief  and  wiped  it 
away. 

22 


338  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

About  this  time  he  was  courted  by  several  legacy- 
hunters  who  were  beating  about  the  bush,  and 
amusing  trifles  from  various  quarters  were  con- 
tinually planted  before  him  in  his  room.  One 
brought  him  a  tall  and  extended  chimney-cam- 
panula, and,  to  make  it  look  taller,  had  it  placed 
upon  a  table  within  a  foot  of  his  nose,  so  that  he 
was  obliged  to  throw  his  head  back  to  survey  it  ; 
and  another  brought  the  French  giant  in  a  coach y 
when  he  was  delighted  to  ecstasy  to  see  him  touch 
the  ceiling.  During  this  visit  Bonomi  made  a 
mould  of  his  immense  right  hand. 

Now  and  then  Nollekens  received  letters  that 
were  written  by  way  of  hoax,  one  of  which,  I 
remember  in  particular,  was  in  the  name  of  a  very 
high  personage,  to  know  what  he  would  charge  for 
cutting  a  figure  in  porphyry  ten  feet  high.  This 
application  Mrs.  Nollekens  absolutely  answered,, 
addressing  her  letter  to  the  nobleman  in  whose 
name  it  was  written,  which  brought  his  lordship  the 
next  day,  when,  to  make  amends  for  the  trouble 
Mrs.  Nollekens  had  taken  in  answering  the  sillv 
writer's  letter,  he  bespoke  a  bust  of  his  lady. 

For  many  years,  every  summer's  morn,  Mr. 
Nollekens  was  up  with  the  rising  sun.  He  began 
his  work  by  watering  his  clay,  when  he  modelled 
till  eight  o'clock,  at  which  hour  he  generally 
breakfasted,  and  then,  as  he  entered  his  studio,, 
would  observe  to  his  workmen  that  every  man 
should  earn  his  breakfast  before  he  ate  it. 

It  is  occasionally  proper  to  expose  in  public 
print   the   cruel   manner    in   which   some   persons 


SIX  FRANCIS  BOURGEOIS  339 


treat  their  nearest  relatives,  in  order  that  other 
hardened  offenders  may  repent  of  their  conduct 
before  it  be  too  late.  Snch  a  person  was  the  late 
Sir  Francis  Bourgeois,1  who  left  his  property  to 
Dulwich  College,  without  leaving  a  farthing  to  his 
niece  and  her  poor,  innocent,  and  unoffending 
children.  I  recollect  Mr.  Nollekens  once  showing 
me  a  letter  which  he  had  received  from  Sir 
William  Beechey,  and,  to  the  best  of  my  re- 
collection, the  purport  of  it  was  that  the  bearer  of 
it  was  the  niece  of  Sir  Francis  Bourgeois,  who  had 
been  walking  about  the  streets  all  night  with  her 
children  for  want  of  a  lodging.  Sir  William  applied 
to  Mr.  Nollekens  to  give  her  a  trifle,  directing  his 
attention  to  her  miserable  looks  and  state  of 
apparel.  God  forbid  we  should  have  other  instances 
of  such  pride  and  cruelty ! 

A  candle  with  Nollekens,  as  is  generally  the  case 
with  misers,  was  a  serious  article  of  consumption, 
indeed,  so  much  so  that  he  would  frequently  put  it 
out  and,  merely  to  save  an  inch  or  two,  sit  entirely 
in  the  dark,  at  times,  too,  when  he  was  not  in  the 
least  inclined  to  sleep.  So  keen  was  he  in  watching 
the  use  of  that  commoclitv,  that  whenever  Bronze 
ventured  into  the  yard  with  a  light,  he  always 
scolded  her  for  so  shamefully  flaring  the  candle. 
One  evening  his  man  Dodimy,  who  then  slept  in 
the  house,  came  home  rather  late,  but  quite  sober 
enough  to  attempt  to  go  upstairs  unheard  without 
his  shoes  ;  but,  as  he  was  passing  Nollekens'  door, 

1  Born  of  Swiss  parentage  in  1756  ;  made  A.R.A.  in  1787  and  R.A. 
in  1793  ;  knighted  by  the  King  of  Poland  in  1791.  He  was  thrown 
from  his  horse  and  killed  in  1811. — Ed. 


340  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

the  immensely-increased  shape  of  the  keyhole  shone 
upon  the  side  of  the  room  so  brilliantly,  that  he 
cried  out  :  c  Who's  there  V  ■  It's  only  me,  sir,' 
answered  Dodimy  ;  ;  I  am  going  to  bed.'  '  Going 
to  bed,  you  extravagant  rascal !  Why  don't  you 
go  to  bed  in  the  dark,  you  scoundrel  ?'  '  It's  my 
own  candle,'  replied  Dodimy.  '  Your  own  candle ! 
Well,  then,  mind  you  don't  set  fire  to  yourself. 
Well,  how  did  you  come  on  at  Lord  George 
Cavendish's  ?  You  have  been  cleaning  bustos 
there  these  six  days.  I  told  you,  Dodimy,  things 
could  not  be  done  so  soon — no,  things  are  not  to  be 
done  in  a  hurry,  Master  Dodimy.'  '  Lord  bless 
you,  sir,  I  had  some  turtle- soup  there  to-day,  and 
such  ale !'  '  Well,  well,  take  care  of  yourself.  I 
say  things  must  not  be  done  in  a  hurry.' 

One  day  Dodimy  opened  the  studio  door,  and 
cried  out,  '  Sir  !  sir !  here  comes  the  Chelsea 
pensioner  to  have  his  shoulders  moulded  for  your 
busto  of  Mr.  Perceval !'  '  What,'  said  Nollekens, 
1  the  man  with  his  two  wooden-legs  and  a  crutch  ?' 
'  Yes,  sir,'  answered  Dodimy.  l  Lord,  sir,  he  has 
left  off  his  crutch,  and  is  swaggering  on  his  buttocks, 
twirling  a  little  switch  just  as  Moses  Kean  used 
to  do.' 

The  late  Moses  Kean  was  a  tailor,  a  stout-built 
man  with  black  bushy  hair  and  a  wooden  leg.  He 
was  always  dressed  in  a  dashing  manner,  in  a  scarlet 
coat,  white  satin  waistcoat,  black  satin  small-clothes, 
and  a  '  Scott's  Liquid  dye '  blue  silk  stocking  ;  he 
had  also  a  long- quartered  shoe,  with  a  large  buckle 
covering  his  foot,  a  cocked  hat,  and  a  ruffled  shirt, 


PORTRAITS  341 


and  never  went  out  without  a  switch  or  cane  in  his 
hand.  He  was  a  very  extraordinary  mimic,  par- 
ticularly in  his  imitations  of  Charles  James  Fox, 
which  he  gave  occasionally  at  the  Little  Theatre  in 
the  Hay  market.  Mr.  Alefounder1  painted  a  whole- 
length  portrait  of  him  as  large  as  life  in  the  above 
dress,  which  was  exhibited  in  the  left-hand  corner 
of  the  ante-room  at  Somerset  House.  There  is  also 
a  whole-length  etching  of  him  of  a  quarto  size. 
Mr.  Edmund  Kean,  the  celebrated  actor,  owes  his 
education  to  the  above  person,  who  was  his  uncle, 
and  when  I  was  a  boy  lived  at  No.  9,  Little  St. 
Martin's  Lane. 

Mr.  Nollekens  in  former  days,  when  he  was  alive 
to  the  interest  of  monev,  before  he  suffered  thou- 
sands  of  pounds  to  rest  in  his  bankers'  hands 
unemployed,  would  write  to  his  tenants  in  the 
following  style,  in  what  he  considered  a  lawyer's 
manner  : 

i  Mr.  Nollekens  request  Mr. will  pay 

him  that  quarter's  rent,  due  the  29th,  forthwith, 
without  delay,  on  or  before  Thursday  next,  twelve 
o'clock  at  noon.' 

Nollekens'  old  coal-box  was  of  a  square  shape  ; 
it  had  been  a  lawyer's  wig-box  that  had  been  sent 
with  a  barrister's  wig  to  be  modelled  from.  This 
box  had  been  mended  with  bits  of  tin,  which  he  had 
picked  up  of  a  morning  near  the  dust-heaps  in  the 
fields  ;  but  his  house  contained  neither  coal-hods 
nor  scoops,  nor  anything  like  the  splendour  of  a 

1  John  Alefounder,  the  miniature  painter.     He  died  at  Calcutta  in 
1795.-ED. 


342  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

certain  created  lord,  who  bad  his  coronet  painted 
upon  his  coal-scuttles. 

Bronze,  who,  as  the  reader  will  recollect,  was 
called  c  Black  Bet '  by  the  Oxford  market  butchers, 
would,  in  her  master's  dotage,  put  her  arm  round 
his  neck  and  ask  him  how  he  did.  ;  What  !' 
observed  Nollekens,  '  now  you  want  some  money 
— I've  got  none.'  c  Why,  sir,  how  am  I  to  buy 
things  for  your  table  without  it  ?  You  have 
enough  of  it,  fresh  and  blooming,  and  all  alive  at 
Chambers's.'  Nollekens :  '  Can  you  dance  ?'  '  Dance, 
sir  !  to  be  sure  I  can.  Give  me  the  cat  ;'  and  then 
she  jigged  about  with  it,  at  which  he  would  laugh 
heartily. 

Nollekens  often  baited  his  rat-trap  with  an 
unusual  quantity  of  cheese,  thinking  to  catch  all 
the  vermin  at  once,  never  dreaming  that  when  one 
was  caught  the  trap  would  shut  the  rest  out,  and 
that  the  solitary  visitor  would  eat  up  the  whole. 
Why  the  rats  infested  his  house,  Bronze  declared 
she  never  could  make  out.  Food  they  certainly 
had  not ;  and  an  old  rat  might  have  said  to  Nolle- 
kens when  he  was  busy  in  setting  his  trap  : 

'  Fear  not,  old  fellow,  for  your  hoard  ; 
I  come  to  lodge,  and  not  to  board.' 

A  lady  of  high  fashion  once  brought  her  child  to 
have  her  beautiful  arm  moulded.  Mr.  Nollekens, 
who,  as  usual  upon  such  occasions,  began  with  his 
gibberish  to  the  child,  '  What  a  pretty  handy - 
dandy  !'  was  requested  by  the  lady  not  to  utter  such 
nonsense,  but  to  proceed  with  his  task  ;  adding, 
that  her  child's  nurse  was  a  well-educated  woman. 


ACTS  OF  KINDNESS  343 

So  determined  was  Nollekens  upon  all  occasions 
to  have  a  pennyworth  for  his  penny,  that  he  has 
frequently  been  noticed,  when  visitor  at  the  Eoyal 
Academy,  to  turn  down  the  hour-glass  whenever 
Charles,  the  model,  got  up  to  rest  himself,  in  order 
that  the  students  might  not  be  deprived  of  one 
moment  of  the  time  for  which  the  model  was  paid. 
However,  one  evening  in  doing  this  he  let  the  glass 
fall  and  broke  it.  This,  he  observed,  he  would 
replace  by  one  which  he  would  bring  from  his 
studio,  muttering,  '  They  don't  make  things  so 
strong  as  they  did  when  I  was  a  boy.' 

One  day  Mrs.  Nollekens,  after  a  trifling  brush 
with  her  husband,  who  had  declined  taking  further 
orders  for  the  studio,  rated  him  soundly  for  paying 
full  wages  to  his  man  Dodimy,  who  had  nothing  to  do 
but  to  sweep  the  yard  and  feed  the  dog.  Nollekens, 
sidling  up  to  Dodimy,  in  a  whisper  told  him  not  to  mind 
her,  for  that  he  would  raise  his  wages  two  shillings 
per  week  purposely  to  spite  her,  that  he  would. 

His  acts  of  kindness,  indeed,  depended  entirely 
on  his  momentary  humour,  for  he  had  no  fixed 
principle  of  generosity.  In  this  he  illustrated  the 
remark  of  Mrs.  Hannah  More,  in  her  4  Christian 
Morals,'  vol.  i.,  p.  187,  where  she  says,  '  We  must 
not  judge  of  our  charity  by  single  acts  and  par- 
ticular instances,  for  they  are  not  always  good  men 
who  do  good  things,  but  by  our  general  tendencies 
and  propensities.  We  must  strive  after  a  uniformity 
in  our  charity,  examine  whether  it  be  equable, 
steady,  voluntary,  and  not  a  charity  of  times  and 
seasons  and  humours.' 


344  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Mr.  Nollekens  was  standing  with  the  late  Earl 
Mansfield  in  his  lordship's  farmyard  at  Kenwood, 
when  a  little  girl  came  up  to  him  and  presented  her 
mother's  compliments  to  Farmer  Mansfield,  and  she 
would  be  obliged  to  him  for  a  jug  of  milk.  '  Who 
is  your  mother,  my  little  dear  ?'  asked  his  lordship. 
4  She's  just  come  to  live  in  that  small  house  close  by 
the  road.'  His  lordship,  with  his  usual  smile,  called 
to  one  of  the  helpers,  and  desired  him  to  fill  the 
child's  mug,  and  if  he  found  the  family  deserving, 
never  to  refuse  them  milk.  Although  Nollekens 
was  frequently  heard  to  relate  the  above  anecdote, 
yet  he  never  felt  the  force  of  this  noble  example,  as 
his  contributions  were  generally  capricious. 

Mr.  Wivell,1  who  is  now  an  artist  of  ability,  was, 
before  the  dawn  of  his  talent,  a  hairdresser,  and,  as 
he  himself  relates,  frequently  shaved  and  dressed 
Mr.  Nollekens,  who  took  great  notice  of  him,  and 
from  whom  he  now  and  then  received  some  kind- 
nesses. Mr.  Wivell  informs  me  that  one  day,  when 
Mr.  Nollekens  was  under  his  hand,  or,  as  Rowland- 
son  humorously  styles  it,  l  a  sufferer  for  decency,' 
Wivell  stated  to  him  that  someone  had  stepped 
into  his  shop  and  carried  off  a  new  hat  which  had 
just  been  sent  home.  The  sculptor,  when  the 
operation  was  over,  took  a  one-pound  note  from  his 
pocket-book,  and  giving  it  to  him,  said,  '  There, 
that  will  buy  you  another.' 

Wivell  was  also  with  him  one  day  when  shirts 
were  mentioned.  '  How  many  do  you  wear  in  a 
week  ?'     asked     Nollekens.      ?  Two,    sir,'    replied 

1  Abraham  Wivell,  the  portrait-painter  (1786-1849).— Ed. 


ABRAHAM  WIVELL  345 

Wivell  ;  '  and  that's  all  my  stock,  for  I  wear  one 
while  the  other  is  washed/  c  Poor  Wivell  !' 
whispered  he,  and  then  gave  him  a  one-pound  note. 
Nollekens'  own  stock  only  consisted  of  three. 

Wivell  was  frequently  invited  to  spend  the  even- 
ing with  him  to  look  over  his  prints.  After  going 
through  those  after  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Mr. 
Wivell  recommended  him  to  throw  out  his  dupli- 
cates ;  which  he  did,  and  then  asked  him  to  value 
them.  '  Sir,'  said  he,  upon  looking  them  over,  '  I 
think  I  could  make  two  guineas  of  them.'  '  What 
will  you  give  me  for  them  ?'  demanded  Nollekens. 
1  Thirty  shillings,'  replied  Wivell.  c  Then,'  said 
the  sculptor,  '  I  won't  sell  them  ;  I'll  give  them 
to  you.' 

Having  had  some  success,  Mr.  Wivell  published 
at  his  own  expense  an  engraving  in  mezzotinto, 
from  Sir  William  Beechey's  portrait  of  his  patron 
Nollekens  ;  and  did  himself  the  pleasure  of  pre- 
senting him  with  a  proof  impression,  also  indulging 
in  the  like  liberality  to  Mrs.  Nollekens.  This  plate, 
however,  did  not  sell,  and  the  engraver  lost  £25  in 
the  undertaking.  Some  time  after  its  publication 
Mr.  Nollekens  informed  the  artist  that  he  wanted 
an  impression  to  give  away,  and  after  asking  the 
price  of  a  proof,  said,  l  Well,  I'll  have  a  print.' 
Upon  its  delivery  he  asked  the  price  of  it.  l  Seven 
shillings  and  sixpence,  sir,  was  the  price  I  put  upon 
it,'  observed  Wivell.  '  Well,  then,  what  will  it  be 
to  me  ?  You  won't  charge  me  that  sum,'  said 
Nollekens.  '  Oh,  sir,  pray  give  me  what  you  please,' 
returned  Wivell,  who  felt  grateful  for  past  favours. 


346  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

'  Well,  then,'  returned  lie,  4  there's  three  shillings 
for  you.' 

He  also  relates  that  Mr.  Nollekens  frequently 
spoke  of  a  man  that  he  met  in  the  fields,  who  would 
now  and  then,  with  all  the  gravity  of  an  apothecary, 
inquire  after  the  state  of  his  bowels.  '  At  last,' 
said  he,  '  I  found  he  wanted  to  borrow  money  of 
me.' 

One  morning,  while  he  was  under  the  razor,  he 
told  Wivell  that  the  dav  before  he  had  witnessed 
two  scenes  of  the  greatest  contrast :  the  first  was 
the  inside  of  Newgate,  where  he  had  been  to  ask 
Mr.  Alexander  Davison  how  he  did  ;  the  other 
was  in  one  of  the  grand  rooms  in  Carlton  House, 
where  he  had  been  to  see  how  the  Prince  was,  and 
that  there  the  tables  were  all  set  out  with  such 
grand  plate  for  an  entertainment,  that  he  could  not 
help  exclaiming  to  himself,  4  What  a  difference  !' 

It  was  now  and  then  amusing  to  hear  Nollekens 
read  the  newspaper  to  his  wife  in  his  most  audible 
voice,  when  she  was  unable  to  read  it  to  him — a 
practice  in  which  she  indulged  him  from  the  period 
of  her  marriage  till  she  became  much  affected  by  a 
paralytic  seizure,  which  deprived  her  of  that  power. 
He  gave  up  a  considerable  portion  of  the  day  for 
that  description  of  mutual  amusement,  for  so  I  may 
fairly  state  it  to  have  been,  as  he  was  perfectly  and 
equally  satisfied  with  his  own  method  of  reading  it 
— for  he  read  the  paper  entirely  through,  beginning 
with  the  play -bills  and  ending  with  the  editor's 
address.  His  partner,  however,  notwithstanding 
her  serious  affliction,  was  often  led  into  a  smile  by 


NOLLE  KENS'  DIARY  347 

his  misnomers  and  bad  pronunciation,  which  were 
at  times  most  whimsically  ridiculous. 

Before  he  became  the  reader  of  these  daily 
papers,  he  frequently  amused  himself  by  recording 
on  the  covers  of  letters  what  he  considered  curious 
daily  events  ;  and  by  looking  over  these  scraps  he 
was  not  only  pleased,  but  would  endeavour  to  amuse 
his  friends  by  now  and  then  reading  them  aloud. 
As  for  works  on  art,  he  cared  for  neither  Shee's 
4  Rhymes,'  Flaxman's  c  Homer,'  nor  Blake's  c  Songs 
of  Innocence.' 

The  following  memoranda  were  copied  from  the 
back  of  one  of  his  charcoal  sketches,  and  will  at 
once  convince  the  reader  of  the  estimation  in  which 
he  sometimes  held  his  leisure  moments  : 

'  1803,  May  23d. — Lady  Newborough  brought  forth  a  second  sun.— 
Sweep  the  parlour  and  kitchen  chimneys. — Clean  the  cestern  in  the 
kitchen. — Lent  Northcot  the  cable  rope  and  the  piece  of  hoke  tre. 

1  1805,  Dec.  30.— Mrs.  Whiteford  brought  to  bed  of  a  sun. 

1 180G,  Feb.  8th.— Died  Mrs.  Peck,  in  Marlbrough-street. 

4  April  14th. — The  Duke  of  Gloster  came  to  my  house. 

'  June  28th. — The  Duke  and  Duches  of  York  came  to  my  house. 

'July  7th. — His  R.  H.  the  Duke  of  Cumberland  made  me  a  visit. 

'  July  19th. — Lord  Wellesley  began  to  set. 

*  August  4th.  —  Sent  to  Lord  Yarborough  the  head  of  Sir  Isack 
Nuton. 

*  1808,  December  16th. — Sent  Mr.  Bignell,  by  order  of  Lady  Jersey, 
Lord  Jersey's  head  in  a  case. 

' 1809,  Jan.  12th.— Cast-off  Mr.  Pitt  for  Mr.  Wilberforce,  by  order 
of  Lord  Muncaster. 

'April  J lth.  The  Dukes  of  York,  Cumberland,  and  Cambridge 
made  me  a  visit.' 

Mr.  Nollekens,  when  modelling  the  statue  of  Pitt 
for  the  Senate  House,  Cambridge,  threw  his  drapery 
over  his  man  Doclimy,  who,  after  standing  in  an 


348  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


immovable  position  for  the  unconscionable  space  of 
two  hours,  had  permission  to  come  down  and  rest 
himself  ;  but  the  poor  fellow  found  himself  so  stiff 
that  he  could  not  move.  4  What  !'  exclaimed  Nolle- 
kens,  c  can't  you  move  yourself  ?  Then  you  had 
better  stop  a  bit.'  I  am  sorry  to  say  there  are 
other  artists  who  go  on  painting  with  as  little  com- 
passion for  their  models. 

Mr.  Arminger  has  declared  that  in  eating  nothing 
could  exceed  the  meanness  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nolle- 
kens,  for  whenever  they  had  a  present  of  a  leveret, 
which  they  always  called  a  hare,  they  contrived,  by 
splitting  it,  to  make  it  last  for  two  dinners  for  four 
persons.  The  one  half  was  roasted,  and  the  other 
jugged. 

Much  has  been  said  respecting  those  sculptors 
who  have  employed  painters  to  make  designs  for 
their  monuments.  How  far  such  assertions  are 
correct  at  the  present  moment  I  will  not  take  upon 
myself  to  say  ;  but  this  I  know,  that  Sir  Joshua 
made  a  sketch  of  his  idea  of  what  Mr.  Nollekens' 
monument  erected  to  the  memory  of  the  three 
captains  should  be,  and  which  certainly  was  attended 
to  by  the  sculptor  in  his  composition. 

To  the  eternal  honour  of  Mr.  Nollekens,  wrho 
was  unquestionably  a  most  curious  compound  of 
misery  and  affluence,  it  should  be  recorded  that  he 
gave  £25  as  his  subscription  to  the  widows  and 
children  of  the  brave  soldiers  who  were  killed  or 
wounded  in  the  glorious  battle  of  Waterloo. 

It  is  reported  that  once  when  Nollekens  was 
walking  round  the  yard  with  a  brother  artist,  he 


AT  THE  BEDSIDE  OF  VOLPONE  349 

was  questioned  by  him  why  he  kept  so  many  small 
pieces  of  marble,  to  which  Nollekens  replied  : 
;  They'll  all  come  into  use.'  '  What's  the  use  of 
this  lump  ?'  asked  his  friend.  '  Oh,  that  will  do  for 
a  small  busto.'  t  Why,  it's  only  seven  inches  thick.' 
4  Ay,  but  then,  you  know,  I  shall  model  a  busto  for 
that  piece  with  the  head  twisted,  looking  over  the 
shoulder  !' 

About  this  time  it  was  highly  amusing  to  witness 
the  great  variety  of  trifling  presents  and  frivolous 
messages  which  he  daily  received.  One  person 
was  particularly  desirous  to  be  informed  where  he 
liked  his  cheese-cakes  purchased  ;  another,  who 
ventured  to  buy  stale  tarts  from  a  shop  in  his 
neighbourhood,  sent  his  servant  in  a  laced  livery  in 
the  evening  to  inquire  whether  his  cook  had  made 
them  to  his  taste  ;  while  a  third  continued  con- 
stantly to  ply  him  with  the  very  best  pig -tail 
tobacco,  which  he  had  most  carefully  cut  in  very 
small  pieces  purposely  for  him.  A  fourth  truly 
kind  friend,  who  was  not  inclined  to  spend  money 
upon  such  speculations  himself,  endeavoured  once 
more  to  persuade  him  to  take  a  cockney  ride  in  a 
hackney-coach  to  Kensington,  to  view  the  pretty 
almond-tree  in  perfect  blossom,  and  to  accept  of  a 
few  gooseberries  to  carry  home  with  him  to  make  a 
tartlet  for  himself  !  A  fifth  sent  him  jellies,  or 
sometimes  a  chicken,  with  gravy  ready  made,  in  a 
silver  butter-boat  ;  and  a  sixth  regularly  presented 
him  with  a  change  of  large  showy  plants  to  stand 
on  the  mahogany  table,  especially  in  his  later  years, 
when  he  was  a  valetudinarian,  so  that  he  might  see 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


them  from  his  bed.  The  sight  of  these  plants  cer- 
tainly amused  him,  but  as  for  the  delightful  odour 
they  diffused,  it  mattered  not  to  him,  as  his  olfac- 
tories were  not  over  delicate,  a  carrion  flower  or  a 
marigold  being  equally  refreshing  to  him  as  a  sprig 
of  jessamine  or  mignonette. 

It  is  a  verv  curious  fact  that  during  seventy 
years'  constant  practice  in  his  art  Nollekens  was 
never  known  to  hold  up  or  to  admire  the  elegance 
of  a  tendril,  or  even  the  leaf  of  a  plant,  nor  to  take 
casts  of  those  simple  and  beautiful  productions  of 
Nature,  the  lily,  the  vine,  the  ivy,  the  olive-branch, 
the  laurel,  or  the  oak,  which  so  often  have  been 
introduced  in  all  ages  and  countries  in  monumental 
sculpture.  This,  however,  is  not  the  case  with 
artists  of  the  present  day. 

Flaxman,  whose  mind  was  elegance  itself,  was 
never  more  delighted  than  in  the  accumulation  of 
such  examples,  nor  has  any  sculptor  displayed  them 
with  greater  taste  ;  and  we  find  by  the  splendid  and 
inestimable  collection  of  foliated  ornaments  so 
liberally  and  tastefully  displayed  on  the  walls  of 
the  staircase  and  painting-rooms  of  Sir  Thomas 
Lawrence,  in  his  house  in  Russell  Square,  that  the 
ancient  Greeks  and  Romans  carefully  and  exten- 
sively studied  that  luxuriant  branch  of  their  art, 
particularly  in  their  architectural  decorations. 

Thus  far,  too,  Mr.  Soane1  may  be  considered 
correct  in  his  assertion  that  the  sculptors  art  is  the 
'  lace- work   of   architecture ' ;    but   that   gentleman 


1  This  eminent  architect  became  Sir  John  Soane  in  1830.     He  died 
in  1837,  at  the  age  of  eighty-four.— Ed. 


ARCHITECTURE  351 

surely  never  could  mean  to  say  that  busts,  figures 
in  niches,  and  groups  of  historical  composition  were 
ever  meant  to  be  so  considered.  Such  a  degrada- 
tion, I  believe,  was  never  attempted.  Indeed,  it  has 
been  a  matter  of  strong  contention  whether  sculp- 
ture should  not  take  the  precedence  of  painting. 
Architecture  should  certainly  be  the  last- mentioned 
of  the  sister  arts,  whatever  ideas  some  architects 
may  entertain  upon  the  subject.  Men  of  true  taste 
visit  a  mansion  upon  the  report  of  its  statues,  busts, 
and  pictures.  The  architecture  of  a  house,  un- 
adorned by  such  productions  of  art,  would  not 
induce  the  general  traveller  to  drive  twenty  miles 
out  of  his  road,  or  even  five.  How  few  allure- 
ments, indeed,  would  the  Marquis  of  Lansdowne's, 
Lord  Pembroke's,  Lord  Egremont's,  Lord  Farn- 
borough's,  Sir  Abraham  Hume's,  Mr.  Peel's,  and 
many  other  noble  mansions  have,  if  totally  desti- 
tute of  their  fine  collections  of  statues  and  pictures ! 
and  however  delightful  maybe  the  society  of  the 
truly  amiable  brothers,  Samuel  and  Henry  Rogers, 
surely  their  visitors  receive  double  pleasure  in 
being  surrounded  not  only  with  some  of  the  finest 
specimens  of  ancient  art,  but  by  the  choicest  works 
of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Wilson,  Stothard,  and 
other  professors  of  the  highest  eminence  and  merit. 


[  352  ] 


CHAPTER  XV. 

Cause  of  Mr.  Nollekens  dismissing  his  confessor — Songs  of  his  youthful 
days — His  bed — Unquiet  nights  productive  of  charity — Liberality  to 
his  domestics— Coarseness  of  his  food  and  manner  of  eating — In- 
feriority of  his  wardrobe,  and  meanness  of  his  domestic  arrange- 
ments—-  Character  of  his  drawings  and  those  of  other  sculptors — His 
monumental  designs  and  models— Infirmity  of  his  latter  days,  and 
death — Attested  copy  of  his  will  and  codicils. 

One  rainy  morning  Nollekens,  after  confession, 
invited  his  holy  father  to  stay  till  the  weather 
cleared  up.  The  wet,  however,  continued  till 
dinner  was  ready,  and  Nollekeng  felt  obliged  to  ask 
the  priest  to  partake  of  a  bird,  one  of  the  last  of  a 
present  from  his  Grace  the  Duke  of  Newcastle. 
Down  they  sat.  The  reverend  man  helped  his  host 
to  a  wing,  and  then  carved  for  himself,  assuring 
Nollekens  that  he  never  indulged  in  much  food, 
though  he  soon  picked  the  rest  of  the  bones.  '  I 
have  no  pudding,'  said  Nollekens  ;  '  but  won't  you 
have  a  glass  of  wine  ?  Oh,  you  have  got  some  ale !' 
However,  Bronzo  brought  in  a  bottle  of  wine  ;  and 
on  the  remove  Nollekens,  after  taking  a  glass, 
went,  as  usual,  to  sleep. 

The  priest,  after  enjoying  himself,  was  desired 


NOLLEKENS  HABITS  353 


by  Nollekens,  while  removing  the  handkerchief 
from  his  head,  to  take  another  glass.  c  Tank  yon, 
sare,  I  have  a  finish  de  bottel.'  \  The  devil  you 
have !'  muttered  Nollekens.  \  Now,  sare,'  continued 
his  reverence,  '  ass  de  rain  be  ovare,  I  vil  take  my 
leaf.'  c  Well,  do  so,'  said  Nollekens,  who  was  not 
only  determined  to  let  him  go  without  his  coffee, 
but  gave  strict  orders  to  Bronze  not  to  let  the  old 
rascal  in  again.  '  Why,  do  you  know,'  continued 
he,  '  that  he  ate  up  all  that  large  bird,  for  he  only 
gave  me  one  wing  ;  and  he  swallowed  all  the  ale, 
and  out  of  a  whole  bottle  of  wine  I  had  only  one 


glass!' 


After  this,  being  without  a  confessor,  Mrs.  Holt, 
his  kind  attendant,  read  his  prayers  to  him  ;  but 
when  she  had  gone  through  them,  his  feelings  were 
so  little  affected  by  his  religious  duties,  that  he 
always  made  her  conclude  her  labours  by  reading 
either  4  Gay's  Fables '  or  '  The  Beggar's  Opera,'  at 
the  latter  of  which,  when  she  came  to  certain  songs, 
he  would  laugh  most  heartily,  saying  :  c  I  used  to 
sing  them  songs  once  ;  and  it  was  when  I  was 
courting  my  Polly.' 

I  recollect  that  the  bedstead  upon  which  Mr. 
Nollekens  slept  of  late  years  was  four-posted,  the 
curtains  being  yellow,  orange,  red,  and  black,  and 
when  first  put  up  they  made  a  most  gorgeous 
display,  though  he  had  for  many  years  but  one 
counterpane,  of  which  he  was  so  extremely  choice 
that  he  would  not  suffer  it  to  be  washed  ;  but  Mrs. 
Holt,  being  ashamed  to  see  it,  put  on  one  of  her 
own  of  a  much  superior  quality.     When  he  saw  it 

23 


354  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

upon  the  bed  lie  swore  at  her,  and  asked  her  why 
it  had  been  washed  ;  but  upon  her  informing  him 
that  it  was  one  of  her  own,  he  allowed  it  to  remain, 
saying,  '  Well,  indeed,  it  does  look  very  comfort- 
able.' When  this  counterpane  required  washing, 
Mrs.  Holt  put  on  his  own,  at  which  he  angrily  cried 
out  :  '  I  won't  have  it  on  ;  I  always  sleep  better 
without  one.  I  don't  like  a  counterpane  ;'  to  which 
she  answered  that  '  the  poorest  creature  in  a 
workhouse  had  a  rug  on  his  bed,  and  that  she  would 
have  it  on.' 

Mrs.  Holt,  to  whom  I  am  obliged  for  many 
particulars  in  this  volume,  who  had  by  her 
amiable  disposition  and  strict  attention  to  cleanli- 
ness rendered  the  two  last  years  of  Mr.  Nollekens' 
life  more  comfortable  than  any  period  of  his 
existence,  informed  me  that  when  he  could  not  rest 
in  his  bed,  he  would  frequently  endeavour  to  raise 
himself  up,  and  call  to  her  to  know  if  she  was 
asleep.  Mrs.  Holt,  who  rested  upon  a  hard  sofa 
by  the  side  of  his  bed,  would  answer :  l  I'm  here, 
sir.  Can  I  give  you  anything  ?'  Nollekens :  '  Sit 
up  ;  I  can't  sleep — I  can't  rest.  Is  there  anybody 
that  I  know  that  wants  a  little  money  to  do  'em 

good  ?'     Mrs.  Holt:  \  Yes,  sir  ;  there  is  Mrs. .' 

Nollekens :  c  Well,  in  the  morning  I'll  send  her  ten 
pounds.'  c  That's  a  good  old  boy,'  said  she,  patting 
him  on  the  back  ;  '  you  will  eat  a  better  dinner  for 
to-morrow,  and  enjoy  it.'  And  Mrs.  Holt  has  added 
that  she  never  knew  him  to  forget  his  promise. 

With  all  his  propensity  for  saving,  he  indulged 
for  many  years  in  the  gratification  of  making  his 


COFFEE  AND  TEA  355 


household  domestics  a  present  of  a  little  sum  of 
money  on  his  birthday ;  and  lately,  upon  this 
occasion,  he  became  even  more  generous,  by 
bestowing  on  them,  to  their  great  astonishment, 
ten  and  twenty  pounds  each. 

A  broad-necked  gooseberry  bottle,  leather- 
bunged,  containing  coffee,  which  had  been  pur- 
chased and  ground  full  forty  years,  was  brought 
out  when  he  intended  to  give  a  particular  friend  a 
treat  ;  .but  it  was  so  dried  to  the  sides  of  the 
bottle  that  it  was  with  difficulty  he  could  scrape 
together  enough  for  the  purpose,  and  even  when  it 
was  made,  time  had  so  altered  its  properties,  from 
the  top  having  been  but  half  closed,  that  it  was 
impossible  to  tell  what  it  had  originally  been.  He 
used  to  say,  however,  of  this  turbid  mixture  : 
4  Some  people  fine  their  coffee  with  the  skin  of  a 
sole,  but  for  my  part,  I  think  this  is  clear  enough 
for  anybody!' 

Mrs.  Wilson,  a  most  amiable  lady,  one  of  the 
daughters  of  Mr.  Major,1  the  late  celebrated 
engraver  of  the  Stamp  Office,  was  once  asked  to 
stay  and  drink  tea  with  him.  As  Mr.  Nollekens 
was  putting  in  more  tea  than  he  would  for  himself, 
he  was  stopped  by  Mrs.  Wilson,  who  observed  that 
she  was  afraid  he  had  misunderstood  her,  for  she 
could  not  stay  ;  on  which  he  muttered,  4  Oh,  I'm 
glad  you  spoke !'  and  then  returned  half  the  tea  out 
of  the  pot  to  the  canister.     I  do  not  wonder  that  so 

1  Thomas  Major,  A.E.  (1720-1799),  the  first  engraver  elected  into 
the  Royal  Academy.  He  was  for  forty  years  Engraver  to  the  King. — 
Ed. 


356  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

elegant  a  woman  as  Mrs.  Wilson  declined  his 
invitation,  particularly  at  this  time,  when  the 
paralytic  seizures  which  he  had  undergone  rendered 
his  society  at  some  times  insupportable,  for,  in- 
dependent of  his  natural  stupidity  and  ignorance 
in  conversation,  his  bodily  humours  appeared  in 
several  parts  of  his  person  as  well  as  his  face, 
which  was  seldom  free  from  eruptions,  particularly 
about  his  mouth. 

Indeed,  poor  man  !  his  appearance  and  want  of 
decent  manners  rendered  it  impossible  for  anyone 
accustomed  to  tolerable  society  to  associate  with 
him  ;  and  yet  there  were  persons,  whose  servants 
would  send  such  an  object  from  their  master's  door, 
who  actually  sat  down  and  partook  of  his  boiled 
rabbit  smothered  with  parsley  and  butter,  even 
when  he  had  thick  napkins  four  times  doubled 
under  his  chin.  For  my  own  part,  I  must  say 
I  always  declined  accepting  an  invitation,  though 
I  have  seen  ladies  arrive  in  their  carriages,  with  an 
expectation  of  being  remembered  when  next  he 
made  his  will,  for  it  was  pretty  well  known  that,  in 
the  course  of  the  last  twenty-five  years,  he  had 
made  several,  in  some  of  which  he  had  remembered 
all  his  old  friends.  However,  I  shall  for  the  present 
drop  this  subject,  and  state  to  my  readers  the  few 
amusements  which  he  enjoyed  at  this  period. 

His  principal  attendant,  Goblet,  who  at  this  time 
was  empowered  with  the  full  control  of  the  studio, 
stone-yard,  and  gate,  cleared  a  space  of  ground 
which  he  formed  into  a  small  garden,  purposely  to 
be  viewed  from  a  window  of  an  upper  room,  into 


WARDROBES  357 


which  he  and  Mrs.  Holt,  and  sometimes  poor  Bronze, 
guided  the  castored  chair  with  the  man  who  had  for 
years  repeatedly  promised  to  make  them  all  happy 
for  life. 

Of  these  three  persons,  Mr.  Nollekens  made  the 
most  free  Avith  Bronze  ;  he  listened  to  her  silly 
nonsense  with  the  full  expectation  of  hearing  what 
she  had  often  said,  and  then  would  joke  in  his  way 
in  return  ;  and  though  she  was  not  over-cleanly  in 
her  domestic  habits  or  person,  he  voraciously  ate 
the  food  prepared  by  her  hands.  His  attendant, 
Mrs.  Holt,  always  cooked  her  own  dinner  ;  for 
lately,  though  Nollekens'  savoury  dish  was  some- 
times relished  by  a  crafty  visitor,  she  declined 
eating  with  him,  well  knowing  how  negligent  Bronze 
was  as  to  the  state  of  her  culinary  articles  before 
she  used  them.  Indeed,  Bronze,  in  her  gray-haired 
state,  became  addicted  to  drinking,  and  then  Mrs. 
Holt  would  not  allow  her  to  dress  anything  more  for 
her  master,  but  kindly  cooked  his  dinner  herself. 

Perhaps  there  never  was  a  Royal  Academician, 
or  even  a  servant  of  one,  whose  wardrobes  were  so 
scantily  provided  with  change  of  dress  as  those  of 
Mr.  Nollekens  and  his  old  servant  Bronze.  He  had 
but  one  nightcap,  two  shirts,  and  three  pairs  of 
stockings  ;  two  coats,  one  of  them  his  pourpre  de 
pape,  one  pair  of  small-clothes,  and  two  waistcoats. 
His  shoes  had  been  repeatedly  mended  and  nailed  ; 
they  were  two  odd  ones,  and  the  best  of  his  last 
two  pair.  This  was  the  amount  of  his  dress : 
indeed,  so  niggardly  was  he  as  to  his  clothes,  that 
when  Mrs.  Holt  took  possession  of  his  effects,  she 


358  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

declared  she  would  not  live  with  him  unless  he  had 
a  new  coat  and  waistcoat.  With  this  reasonable 
request  he  complied,  saying  nothing  about  any  other 
part  of  his  dress. 

Poor  Bronze,  who  had  to  support  herself  upon 
what  were  called  board-wages,  had  barely  a  change, 
and  looked  more  like  the  wife  of  a  chimney- 
sweeper than  any  other  kind  of.  human  being.  As 
for  table  linen,  two  small  breakfast-napkins  and  a 
large  old  tablecloth,  a  descendant  in  the  family, 
which,  when  used,  was  always  folded  into  four, 
was  the  whole  of  his  stock  ;  for  he  possessed  no 
doileys,  and  Bronze  declared  to  me  that  she  had 
never  seen  such  a  thing  as  a  jack-towel  in  the 
house,  nor  even  the  nail-holes  where  one  had  been. 
She  always  washed  without  soap:  there  were  no 
hearth -stones  nor  blacklead  dust  for  the  stoves  ; 
nor  a  cake  of  whitening  for  the  kitchen-grate  ;  nor 
even  a  yard  of  oil- cloth  to  preserve  the  stones  from 
grease,  much  less  an  old  bit  of  bedside  carpet,  to 
keep  the  bones  of  poor  old  Bronze  free  from 
rheumatism. 

In  this  state  Mrs.  Holt  found  things  at  No.  9, 
Mortimer  Street,  and  in  a  worse  condition  did  they 
appear  when  the  secrets  of  the  prison-house  were 
laid  open,  as  will  be  found  after  the  insertion  of  Mr. 
Nollekens'  will  in  a  future  page  of  this  volume. 

Of  late  years  he  diverted  himself  with  several 
sketch-books  filled  with  outlines  and  measurements 
of  busts,  statues,  groups,  and  basso-relievos,  which 
he  had  most  industriously  and  carefully  made 
during     his    residence    in    Italy   from    numerous 


NOLLEKENS  SKETCHES  359 

fragments,  and  several  celebrated  antiques  in  the 
Vatican,  the  Palaces,  and  Villas  Bassano,  Belvidere, 
Bologna,  Borghese,  Frascati,  Giustiniani,  Loretto, 
Mantua,  Massani,  Tivoli,  etc. 

These  sketch-books,  which  are  now  mostly  in  the 
possession  of  Mrs.  Palmer,  may  very  justly  be  con- 
sidered to  contain  some  of  his  best  drawings,  and 
are  beyond  doubt  most  valuable  memoranda.  Of 
the  interesting  subjects  delineated — particularly  as 
to  their  measurements,  which  in  my  belief  are 
strictly  accurate — the  outlines  in  my  mind  bear  too 
visibly  the  cold  hand  of  perseverance  only,  since 
they  are  not  executed  with  anything  like  the  feel- 
ing with  which  Flaxman  drew ;  and  when  compared 
with  his  Italian  studies,  also  made  from  some  of 
the  same  antiques,  they  fall  far  short  of  the  mind 
visible  in  everything  Flaxman  touched,  even  in  his 
earliest  years. 

However  this  may  be,  and  feebly  as  Nollekens' 
copies  were  made,  he  unquestionably  not  only  con- 
siderably out-stripped  his  master  Scheemakers,  but, 
to  do  him  only  common  justice,  his  strides  were 
considered  greatly  beyond  the  usual  extent  of  the 
abilities  in  drawing  of  the  sculptors  of  his  early 
days — Eysbrack  excepted,  whose  drawings,  though 
certainly  considerably  mannered,  possess  a  fertility 
of  invention  and  a  spirit  of  style  in  their  execution 
seldom  emanating  from  the  hand  of  a  sculptor  of 
modern  times.  They  are  for  the  most  part  washed 
in  bistre,  and  are  frequently  to  be  met  with. 
Painters,  and  indeed  engravers,  at  that  time  were 
much  better  draughtsmen  than  the  sculptors.    There 


360  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

were  Moser,  Mortimer,  Cipriani,  West,  Barry, 
Bartolozzi,  Sherwin,  Ryland,  Strutt,  Legat,  and 
Grignon,  wlio  drew  the  figure  well.  Since  their 
time  we  have  been  enabled  to  boast  of  Blake, 
Flaxman,  Lawrence,  Stothard,  Burney,  Ryley, 
Howard,  Hilton,  Etty,  Briggs,  and  Morton,  all 
faithful  and  constant  delineators  of  form  and 
muscular  action.  Michael  Angelo's  productions  as 
a  draughtsman  were  divinely  magnificent,  and  they 
are  pre-eminently  placed  in  all  collections  where 
they  are  to  be  found  ;  he  drew  with  the  pen  or 
charcoal,  and  also  in  red  chalk,  but  most  of  his 
finest  drawings  are  in  black  chalk,  in  which  he 
seemed  to  delight,  if  we  may  judge  from  the 
exquisite  manner  in  which  many  of  them  are 
finished.  When  I  had  the  honour  of  viewing  Sir 
Thomas  Lawrence's  princely  collection  of  drawings 
by  Michael  Angelo  and  Raffaelle,  their  productions 
alone  engaged  my  admiration  from  seven  o'clock 
till  past  eleven.  Jeremiah  Harman,  Esq.,  has  also 
some  most  powerful  drawings  by  Michael  Angelo, 
which  were  brought  into  England  by  W.  Y.  Ottley, 
Esq. 

During  Nollekens'  juvenile  practice  he  received 
a  few  lessons  in  drawing  from  a  sculptor  now  but 
little  known,  Michel  Henry  Spang,  a  Dane,1  who 
drew  the  figure  beautifully  and  with  anatomical 
truth — a  most  essential  component  of  the  art,  in- 

1  Spang,  who  produced  that  small  anatomical  figure  so  well  known 
to  every  draughtsman  who  assiduously  studies  his  art.  He  also  de- 
signed and  executed  the  Ggures  on  the  pediment  of  Earl  Spencer's 
house  in  the  Green  Park,  and  the  decorations  on  the  screen  at  the 
dmiralty. — Smith.     Spang  died  about  1767.— Ed. 


NOLLE  KENS  AS  A   SCULPTOR  361 

dispensably  requisite  for  all  those  who  would  climb 
to  the  summit  of  Fame ;  but  this  invaluable  ac- 
quirement was  neglected  by  Nollekens,  nor  did  he 
at  any  period  of  his  life  venture  to  carve  a  subject 
in  which  a  knowledge  of  anatomy  would  have  been 
extensively  wanted  :  his  naked  figures  were  of  the 
most  simple  class,  being  either  a  young  Bacchus,  a 
Diana,  or  a  Venus,  with  limbs  sleek,  plump,  and 
round ;  but  I  never  knew  him,  like  Banks,  to 
attempt  the  grandeur  of  a  Jupiter  or  even  the 
strength  of  a  gladiator.  His  monumental  effigies, 
too,  were  always  so  draped  and  placid  that  very 
little  expression  of  muscle  was  exercised.  Nolle- 
kens'  large  academical  drawings,  made  when  he 
was  Visitor  in  the  Royal  Academy,  were  feebly 
executed :  his  men  were  destitute  of  animation,  and 
his  females  often  lame  in  the  joints  ;  their  faces 
were  usually  finished  up  at  home  from  his  wife,  and 
in  compliment  to  her  he  generally  contrived  to  give 
them  little  noses. 

There  were  in  the  Academy  at  the  time  when 
Mr.  Nollekens  was  Visitor,  three  young  sculptors 
who  drew  remarkably  well — Flaxman,  Proctor1  and 
Deare — whose  abilities  were  so  much  noticed  by 
their  fellow -students  that  Nollekens  gave  up  his 
practice  of  drawing  for  that  of  modelling  the  figure 
in  basso-relievo,  and  many  of  his  productions  pos- 
sessed great  merit.  Having  throughout  his  long 
life  had  fewer  vexations  than  most  men,  by  reason 
of  his  natural  imbecility,  he  was   on  all  occasions 

1  Thomas    Proctor,   the    sculptor    and    painter    (1753-1793).     See 
Prefatory  Essay.— Ed. 


362         NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

industriously  inclined  to  his  art,  and  was  never 
known  to  riot  in  dissipation  ;  on  the  contrary, 
whenever  he  was  not  engaged  in  modelling,  he 
employed  himself,  particularly  in  the  evening,  in 
making  designs  upon  the  backs  of  letters  and  other 
scraps  of  paper  for  every  description  of  monument 
of  the  simple  kind,  such  as  a  female  weeping  or 
entwining  festoons  of  flowers  over  an  urn,  or  a 
child  with  an  inverted  torch  ;  and  for  one  and  the 
same  monument  I  have  known  him  make  half  a 
dozen  or  more  trials. 

Quantities  of  these  sketches  were  purchased  at 
his  auction  by  Mrs.  Palmer,  who,  having  so  many 
of  his  works,  at  one  time  had  an  idea  of  building  a 
room  for  their  reception,  as  I  have  been  informed 
by  Mr.  Taylor,1  the  pupil  of  Frank  Hayman,  who 
still  continues  an  inquisitive  and  communicative 
man,  notwithstanding  his  great  age,  which  now  and 
then  screens  him  from  the  retort  courteous. 

These  sketches  were  often  in  pencil,  or  some- 
times finished  in  Indian  ink,  but  many  of  his  later 
ones  were  drawn  only  with  charcoal ;  he  kept  them 
always  at  hand  to  show  a  gentleman  who  had  lost 
his  wife,  or  a  lady  who  had  been  deprived  of  her 
husband  or  child  ;  and  he  has  often  been  heard  to 
say  when  he  has  received  an  order  for  a  monu- 
ment, c  You  see,  I  take  'em  when  the  tear's  in  the  eye.' 

The  greatest  pleasure  our  sculptor  ever  received 
was  when  modelling  small  figures  in  clay,  either 
singly  or  in  groups,  which  he  had  baked  ;  and  in 

1  John  Taylor,  known  as  'Old  Taylor,'  long  outlived  Smith,  and 
died  in  1838,  in  his  ninety-ninth  year. — Ed. 


MODELS  363 

consequence  of  his  refusing  to  sell  them,  and  giving 
very  few  away,  they  became  so  extremely  numerous 
that  they  not  only  afforded  a  great  display  of  his  in- 
dustry, hut  considerable  entertainment  to  his  friends. 

His  talent  in  this  way  was  esteemed  superior  to 
many  things  executed  by  him  of  a  large  size,  and  it 
would  ill  become  me,  after  venturing  to  amuse  my 
readers  with  my  old  master's  weaknesses,  if  T  were, 
by  my  silence  upon  these  beautiful  models,  to  deprive 
him  of  one  particle  of  that  share  of  praise  to  which 
he  was  so  deservedly  entitled  for  their  composition 
and  spirit  ;  for  though  he  was  but  a  poor  artist  as 
a  draughtsman,  no  one  equalled  him  in  his  time  as 
a  modeller,  particularly  in  his  Venuses.  There  is 
in  some  of  them,  notwithstanding  their  want  of 
that  grace  which  he  might  have  derived  from  the 
antique,  a  luxuriant  display  of  Nature's  elegance, 
of  which  there  was  then  no  sculptor  better  able  to 
make  a  selection. 

His  models  towards  the  decline  of  his  practice 
were  not  possessed  of  much  variety  of  composition  ; 
and  as  for  his  attempts  in  his  latter  years,  they 
very  much  resembled  the  productions  of  a  dozing 
man.  However,  I  will  still  do  him  the  justice  to 
own  that  they  were  in  some  points  natural,  and  to 
the  last  evinced  a  strong  attachment  to  his  branch 
of  the  art,  although  produced  in  his  second  child- 
hood. As  a  proof  of  my  assertion,  Sir  William 
Beechey  has  a  little  group,  possessing  much  merit, 
which  Nollekens  modelled  from  his  design  only  a 
short  time  before  his  last  attack  ;  though  he  would 
then  occasionally  leave    off  and   give  Bronze,  his 


364  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

poor  old  servant,  money  to  dance  his  favourite  cat, 
c  Jenny  Dawdle,'  round  about  the  room  to  please 
him,  and  at  which  he  would  always  laugh  himself 
heartily  into  a  fit  of  coughing,  and  continue  to 
laugh  and  cough,  with  tears  of  pleasure  trickling 
down  his  cheeks  upon  his  bib,  until  Bronze  declared 
the  cat  to  be  quite  tired  enough  for  that  morning. 
This  cat,  the  favourite  of  her  master,  his  constant 
companion  at  his  breakfast  and  dinner  table,  being 
no  longer  praised  and  petted  by  her  master's  visitors 
after  his  death,  was  kindly  rescued  from  unthinking 
boys,  or  the  stealers  of  cats  for  the  sake  of  their 
skins,  by  Mrs.  Holt,  who  took  her  to  her  home, 
which  she  had  left  to  oblige  Mr.  Nollekens,  where 
it  now  enjoys  a  warm-hearted  fireside  friend.  As 
for  the  fate  of  poor  Bronze,  alas  !  a  future  page 
will  declare  it. 

In  this  state  of  imbecility  he  continued  to  exist 
for  a  considerable  time,  under  the  kind  superintend- 
ence of  his  housekeeper,  Mrs.  Holt,  who  deserves 
the  highest  praise  for  the  feeling  manner  in  which 
she  watched  over  him.  As  for  his  faithful  servant 
poor  Betty,  whose  name  was  dropped  at  the  begin- 
ning of  this  work  for  that  of  Bronze,  she  was  too 
old  and  feeble  to  do  much  ;  her  hair  had  become 
gray  in  his  service,  and  she  was  not  altogether 
unlike  the  figure  of  the  poor  old  soul  so  wretchedly 
employed  in  lighting  the  fire  in  the  miser's  room, 
represented  by  Hogarth  in  his  first  plate  of  'The 
Rake's  Progress.'  Goblet,  his  principal  carver,  who 
had  slept  in  the  house  for  some  months,  was  at  all 
times  ready,  night  and  day,  to  render  him  every 


THE  WILL  365 


assistance  in  his  power,  for  which  he  had  been 
induced  to  give  up  his  own  domestic  comforts. 
His  medical  attendant  was  Sir  Anthony  Carlisle,1 
who  for  a  long  time  had  visited  him  at  all  hours, 
and  who  was  always  with  him  at  the  shortest 
possible  notice,  and  whose  kind  and  skilful  hand 
frequently  relieved  his  sufferings,  for  he  had  been 
visited  in  the  course  of  his  life  with  three  paralytic 
seizures. 

Under  these  circumstances  Mr.  Nollekens  at  length 
departed  this  life  in  the  drawing-room  on  the  first 
floor,  at  the  south-east  corner  of  his  house,  April  23, 
1823,  in  the  presence  of  Mrs.  Holt  and  Mr.  Goblet, 
who  immediately  sent  to  inform  the  three  executors, 
of  which  number  he  had,  upon  the  death  of  my 
honoured  friend,  the  Rev.  Edward  Balme,  chosen 
me  to  be  one.  I  considered  it  my  duty  to  attend 
the  same  day,  when  I  found  Sir  William  Beechey. 
The  next  day  Mr.  Douce  met  us,  and  the  will  was 
read.     The  following  is  an  attested  copy. 

This  is  the  last  Will  and  Testament  of  me,  Joseph  Nollekens, 
of  Mortimer-street,  in  the  Parish  of  St.  Mary-le-bone,  in  the  County 
of  Middlesex,  Esquire  :  I  desire  that  my  body  be  decently  deposited 
in  the  vault  under  the  parish  church  of  Paddington,  in  the  said 
County  ;  and  that  there  be  not  any  scarfs  given  at  my  funeral,  but 
that  I  be  buried  in  a  plain  black  coffin,  without  any  gilt  ornaments. 
And  that  all  such  just  debts  as  I  shall  owe  at  the  time  of  my  decease, 
and  my  funeral  and  testamentary  charges  and  expenses  be  paid  and 
satisfied.  I  give  to  Mrs.  Frances  Burslem,  of  Michleover,  in  the 
County  of  Derby,  the  sum  of  two  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  Mrs. 
Mary  Lee,  late  the  widow  of  my  esteemed  friend  Caleb  Whitefoord, 
Esquire,  deceased,  the  sum  of  one  hundred  pounds,  to  be  paid  into 
her  own  proper  hands,  for  her  sole  and  separate  use,  and  for  which 

1  The  eminent  surgeon  and  physiologist  (1768-1840). — Ed. 


366  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

her  receipt  alone  (notwithstanding  her  coverture)  shall  be  a  sufficient 
discharge  to  my  Executors  hereinafter  named.  I  give  to  Mr.  Lee, 
the  husband  of  the  said  Mary  Lee,  the  sum  of  five  hundred  pounds, 
in  trust  for  Maria  Whiteford,  Caleb  Whiteford,  Charles  Whiteford, 
Harriet  Whiteford,  and  John  Whiteford,  children  of  the  said  Mary 
Lee,  by  her  said  former  husband,  in  equal  shares,  and  to  be  paid  them 
at  their  respective  ages  of  twenty-one  years  ;  but  if  any,  or  either  of 
them,  shall  happen  to  die  before  attaining  that  age,  then  as  to  the 
parts  of  him,  her,  or  them,  so  dying,  in  trust  for  the  survivors  or 
survivor  of  them,  equally  between  such  survivors,  if  more  than  one  ; 
and  the  interest  of  their  said  several  shares  to  be  in  the  meantime 
paid  or  applied  towards  their  respective  maintenance  or  education. 
And  I  direct  that  the  receipt  of  the  said  Mr.  Lee  shall  be  a  sufficient 
discharge  to  my  Executors  for  the  same  legacy.  And  that  they  shall 
not  afterwards  be  liable  to  see  to  the  application  or  disposition  of  the 
said  legacy,  or  any  part  thereof,  I  give  to  the  said  Mr.  Lee  the  sum 
of  one  hundred  pounds,  as  an  acknowledgment  for  the  trouble  he 
will  have  in  the  execution  of  the  aforesaid  trust.  I  give  to  Mary 
Ann  Bonomi,  Agnes  Bonomi,  Justina  Bonomi,  Ignatius  Bonomi, 
Joseph  Bonomi,  and  Charles  Bonomi,  children  of  my  late  friend 
Mrs.  Rosa  Bonomi,  one  hundred  pounds  each,  to  be  paid  them  at 
their  respective  ages  of  twenty-one  years ;  but  if  any,  or  either  of 
them,  shall  happen  to  die  before  attaining  that  age,  then  I  give  the 
aforesaid  legacy  or  legacies  of  him,  her,  or  them,  so  dying,  unto  the 
survivors  or  survivor  of  them,  equally  between  such  survivors,  if 
more  than  one.  And  I  direct  that  the  interest  of  their  said  several 
legacies  may,  if  deemed  necessary,  be  in  the  meantime  paid  or  applied 
towards  their  respective  maintenance  or  education.  I  give  to  my 
friend  Mrs.  Mary  Lloyd,  widow  of  the  late  Captain  Hugh  Lloyd,  one 
hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  my  friend  Sir  William  Beechey  two 
hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  Mrs.  Mary  Zoffany  three  hundred 
pounds.  I  give  to  Mrs.  Green,  widow  of  the  late  Yalentine  Green, 
one  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  my  worthy  friend,  Francis  Douce, 
Esquire,  the  book  of  all  my  prints  by  Albert  Durer,  together  with 
the  print  of  the  Triumphant  Arch  of  the  Emperor  Maximilian  ;  also 
the  golden  medallion  which  I  obtained  at  Rome,  in  the  year  One 
Thousand  Seven  Hundred  and  Sixty-eight ;  but  I  request  that  he 
do,  at  his  decease,  leave  and  bequeath  the  said  prints  unto  the  British 
Museum.  I  give  to  my  worthy  friend,  the  Reverend  Mr.  Kerrick, 
one  hundred  pounds  ;  and  I  desire  that  he  the  said  Mr.  Kerrick  do 
select  from  my  Prints  of  Reubens,  twelve  of  them  for  his  collection, 
and  which  twelve  Prints  I  hereby  bequeath  tr  him.     I  give  to  my 


THE  WILL  367 


old  friend,  Benjamin  West,  Esquire,  one  hundred  pounds,  with  the 
model  of  his  bust.  I  give  to  my  old  friend,  Richard  Cosway,  Esquire, 
one  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  the  Reverend  Mr.  Wollaston,  of 
South  Weale,  one  hundred  pounds,  as  a  token  of  my  regard  for  him. 
I  give  to  my  old  friend,  Mr.  J.  Taylor,  of  Cirencester-place,  Mary- 
]e-bone,  one  hundred  pounds.  I  give  and  remit  to  my  friend,  Mrs. 
Elizabeth  Rumsey,  the  principal  and  interest  due  from  her  to  me,  on 
her  promissory  note  for  one  hundred  pounds  ;  and  I  direct  that  the 
said  note  be  delivered  up  to  her  to  be  cancelled.  I  give  to  my  esteemed 
friend,  Mrs.  Walford,  one  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  Mr.  Charles 
Robertson,  of  Great  Marlborough-street,  fifty  pounds,  as  a  testimony 
of  the  regard  I  have  for  him.  I  give  to  Mrs.  Byrne,  widow  of  the 
late  Mr.  Byrne,  Engraver,  one  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  Miss 
Susanna  Devins,  two  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  the  Reverend 
Doctor  Charles  Symmons,  two  hundred  pounds.  I  give  to  Mr.  John 
Woodcock,  cousin  of  my  late  dear  wife,  three  hundred  pounds.  I 
give  to  Mr.  John  Soilleux,  of  Notting-hill,  Kensington,  one  hundred 
pounds.  I  give  to  Doctor  Rudeman,  of  Bryanstone- street,  fifty 
pounds.  I  give  to  Mrs.  Mary  Holt,  fifty  pounds.  I  give  to  Mrs. 
Gerrard,  nineteen  guineas.  I  give  to  Hancock,  my  Hair-dresser, 
nineteen  guineas.  I  give  to  Mary  Bailleux,  now  in  Saint  George's 
workhouse,  forty  pounds.  I  give  to  Mrs.  Henshall,  nineteen  guineas. 
I  give  to  Elizabeth  Clements,  my  servant,  nineteen  guineas.  I  give 
to  Mary  Fearey,  my  late  servant,  all  my  wearing  apparel,  clothes, 
and  body-linen.  I  give  to  Sebastian  Gahagan,  Alexander  Goblet,  and 
George  Lupton,  three  of  my  workmen,  one  hundred  pounds  each, 
to  be  paid  as  soon  as  convenient  after  my  decease  ;  and  to  George 
Gahagan,  another  of  my  said  workmen,  twenty  pounds,  to  be  paid 
in  like  manner.  I  give  to  Louisa  Goblet,  daughter  of  the  said 
Alexander  Goblet,  thirty  pounds.  I  give  to  the  said  Mary  Fearey, 
to  Ann  Clibbon,  my  late  servant,  and  to  Dodemy,  (another  of  my 
workmen)  an  annuity  of  thirty  pounds  to  each  of  them,  for  their 
respective  lives,  to  be  paid  by  equal  half  yearly  payments,  the  first 
of  such  payments  to  be  made  at  the  end  of  six  calendar  months  next 
after  my  decease.  I  give  to  the  Trustees  or  Treasurer,  for  the  time 
being,  of  the  Saint  Patrick  Orphan  Charity  School,  three  hundred 
pounds  for  the  benefit  of  the  said  school.  I  give  to  the  Treasurer 
or  Treasurers  of  the  Middlesex  Hospital,  three  hundred  pounds  for 
the  benefit  of  the  said  hospital.  I  give  to  the  Treasurer  or  Treasurers 
of  the  Parish  Charity  School  of  Saint  Mary-le-bone,  three  hundred 
pounds  for  the  benefit  of  the  said  school.  I  give  to  the  Treasurer  or 
Treasurers  of  the  Society  for  the  Relief  of  Persons  imprisoned  for 


368  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Small  Debts,  three  hundred  pounds,  for  the  purposes  of   the  said 
society.     I  give  to  the  Treasurer  or  Treasurers  of  the  Meeting  or 
Contribution  for  the  Relief  of  distressed  Seamen,  held  at  the  King's 
Head  Tavern  in  the  Poultry,  nineteen  guineas,  to  be  applied  for  the 
purposes  of  the  said  meeting.     I  desire  that  my  collection  of  virtu 
in  antiques,  marbles,  busts,  models,  printed  books,  prints,  and  draw- 
ings,  (except  such  books  and  prints  as  I  have  hereinbefore  given) 
be  sold  by  public  auction ;  and  that  the  said  Alexander  Goblet  be 
employed  to  arrange,  repair,  and  clean  my  said  marbles,  busts,  and 
models,  to  fit  them  for  sale,  under  the  direction  of  my  executors  ; 
and  that  he,  the  said  Alexander  Goblet,  be   paid  for  his   trouble 
therein,  at  the  rate  of  one  guinea  per  day,  during  such  time  as  he 
shall  be  so  engaged,  and  which  I  suppose  may  be  effected  in  three  or 
four  days  ;  and  I  desire  that  my  said  antiques,  marbles,  busts,  models, 
books,  prints,  and  drawings,  (except  as  aforesaid,)  be  sold  by  Mr. 
Christie,  of  Pall  Mall.     I  give  to  the  said  Francis  Douce,  Esquire, 
and  to  the  Reverend  Edward  Balme,  the  Executors  of  this  my  Will, 
five  hundred  pounds  each,  as  an  acknowledgement  for  their  trouble. 
I  give  to  Mrs.  Sadler  my  leasehold  house,  situate  and  being  No.  66, 
Great  Portland-street,  now  in  her  occupation ;   and  all   my  estate, 
term,  and  interest  therein.     I  give  to  Mrs.  Hawkins  my  leasehold 
house,  situate  in  Edward-street,  Manchester-square,  now  in  her  occu- 
pation ;    and   all   my  estate,  term,  and   interest  therein.     I  give  to 
Jasper  Peck,  Esquire,  my  four  leasehold  houses,  situate  in  St.  James's- 
street ;   my  four  other  houses,  situate  in  Edward-street,  aforesaid ; 
my  two  ground-rents  of  two  houses,  in  the  same  street ;  my  leasehold 
house  in  Margaret-street,  Cavendish-square  ;  and  my  two  corner  houses 
in  Norton-street  and  Clipstone-street,  and  all  my  estate  and  interest 
therein  respectively.     And  as  to  my  property  in  the  funds  at  the 
Bank  of   England,  the   monies   to    arise   by  the  sales  hereinbefore 
directed,  the  debts  that  shall  be  owing  to  me  at  my  decease,  and  all 
other  the  residue  of  my  estate  and  effects  whatsoever,  I  give  the  same 
to  Mr.  Francis  Russell  Palmer,  of  Cumberland-place,  New-road,  and 
the  said  Francis  Douce,  and  Mr.  Edward  Balme,  equally  to  be  divided, 
between  them.     And  I  appoint  the  said  Francis  Douce  and  Edward 
Balme,  Executors  of  this  my  Will.    And  I  declare  that  they,  or  either 
of  them,  or  their  respective  Executors,  shall  not  be  charged  or  charge- 
able with,  or  answerable  or  accountable  for  any  loss  or  damage  that 
may  happen  of  or  to  my  estate  and  effects,  or  any  part  thereof,  so 
as  the  same  happens  without  their  wilful  neglect  or  default ;  and  that 
they,  or  any,  or  either  of  them,  shall  not  be  answerable  or  accountable 
for  the  others  or  other  of  them,  or  for  the  receipts,  payments,  acts* 


THE  WILL  369 


neglects,  or  defaults  of  the  others  or  other  of  them,  but  each  of  them 
only  for  himself,  and  his  own  receipts,  payments,  acts,  neglects,  and 
defaults.  And  that  they  my  said  Executors,  and  their  respective 
Executors,  shall  and  may,  by,  from,  and  out  of  my  estate  and  effects, 
or  any  part  thereof,  deduct,  retain,  and  reimburse  himself  and  them- 
selves respectively,  all  such  costs,  charges,  and  expenses  as  they  shall 
respectively  pay,  sustain,  or  be  put  unto,  in  or  about  the  execution  of 
this  my  Will  or  relating  thereto..  And  I  do  hereby  revoke  and  make 
void  all  and  every  other  will  and  wills  by  me  at  any  time  or  times 
heretofore  made,  and  do  publish  and  declare  this  to  be  my  last  Will 
and  Testament.  In  witness  whereof,  I  have  to  this  my  last  Will  and 
Testament  contained  in  three  sheets  of  paper,  set  my  hand  and  seal 
(that  is  to  say)  have  set  my  hand  to  the  two  first  sheets,  and  to  this 
third  and  last  sheet  have  set  my  hand  and  seal,  this  twenty-first  day 
of  March,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and 
eighteen. 

Joseph  Nollekens,  l.s. 
Signed,  sealed,  published  and  declared  by  the  said  Joseph 
Nollekens  the  Testator,  as  and  for  his  last  Will  and  Testa- 
ment in  the  presence  of  us  who  at  his  request  in  his  presence, 
and  in  the  presence  of  each  other,  have  subscribed  our  names 
as  witnesses  thereunto. 


Henry  Jeanneret,  )    _     • 

-c,  n         n  f    Golden-square. 

Edward  Cary  Grojan,  3  * 


No.  1. 

I  give  to  Mrs.  Harness  of  Stanmore  in  the  County  of  Middlesex  a 
Cousin  of  my  late  dear  wife  Mary  Nollekens,  three  hundred  pounds 
and  I  publish  and  declare  this  to  be  a  Codicil  to  my  foregoing  Will 
witness  my  hand  and  seal  this  twenty  seventh  day  of  March  one 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  eighteen. 

Joseph  Nollekens,  l.s. 
Signed  sealed  and  published  by  the 
said  Joseph  Nollekens  in  the  pre- 
sence of  us 

Henry  Jeanneret, 
W.  T.  Stubbs. 

No.  2. 

I  will  and  direct  that  the  annuity  of  thirty  pounds  by  my  Will 
given  to  Mary  Fearey  therein  named  be  increased  to  an  annuity  of 
fifty  pounds  and  that  the  annuity  of  thirty  pounds  by  my  said  Will 
given  to  Ann  Clibbon  therein  also  named  be  increased  to  an  annuity  of 

24 


37o  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

forty  pounds  which  increased  annuities  I  give  to  them  respectively  (in 
lieu  of  the  said  annuities  given  them  by  my  said  Will)  and  to  be  paid 
half  yearly  as  in  my  said  Will  mentioned  I  give  to  Mr.  Henshall  of 
Mortimer  street  Stone  Mason  (over  and  above  the  legacy  by  my  said 
Will  given  to  Mrs.  Henshall  his  wife)  the  sum  of  one  hundred  pounds 
and  I  publish  and  declare  this  to  be  a  further  Codicil  to  my  said  Will, 
witness  my  hand  and  seal  this  twenty  fourth  day  of  June,  one 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  eighteen. 

Joseph  Nollekens,  l.s. 
Signed,  sealed,  and  published  by  the 
said  Joseph  Nollekens,  in  the  pre- 
sence of  us, 

Henry  Jeanneret, 
Edw.  Cary  Grojan. 

No.  3. 

Has  a  presant  to  Maria  Yerninck,  daughter  of  the  "Reverend 
Doctor  and  the  Honorable  Mrs.  Yerninck,  of  Camberwell,  who  was 
the  Goddaughter  of  my  late  dear  wife  Mrs.  Nollekens,  and  was  in 
May  last  six  years  of  age  the  sum  of  two  hundred  pounds  Also,  I 
have  given  to  Sophia  Baroness  de  Belmont  the  sum  of  two  hundred 
pounds  as  a  remembrance  I  had  of  her  late  worthy  father.  God  bless 
them  boath.     These  are  boath  paid  October  the  29th,  1818. 

Joseph  Nollekens. 

I  desire  that  Mr.  Carlisle  the  Surgent  be  presented  with  a  note  of 
fifty  pounds  for  his  attendance  on  me. 

No.  4. 

It  is  my  desier  and  request  that  my  executors  do  make  a  presant  of 
the  sum  of  two  hundred  pounds  to  each  of  the  daughters  of  Mr.  John 
Woodcock  cousens  of  my  late  dear  wife  Maria  Nollekens,  that  they 
shall  not  be  at  the  expences  of  the  legacy  duty  videlicit,  Mary  Ann 
Woodcock  and  her  sister  Mrs.  Cockell,  wife  of  Mr.  Cockell,  Surgen,  of 
Bronwick  Terrace,  Hackney  Road  this  20th  day  of  November,  1818. 

Joseph  Nollekens. 

(Witness) 

Wm.  Wingfield, 
George-street,  Hanover-square. 

No.  5. 

I  revoke  the  legacy  or  bequest  in  my  foregoing  Will  contained  of 
my  property  in  the  funds  at  the  Bank  of  England  the  monies  to  arise 
by  the  sales  in  my  said  Will,  directed  the  debts  that  shall  be  owing  me 


CODICILS  371 


at  my  decease,  and  all  other  the  residue  of  my  estate  and  effects  to  Mr. 
Francis  Russell  Palmer,  Mr.  Francis  Douce,  and  Mr.  Edward  Balme 
equally  between  them  ;  and  in  lieu  and  stead  thereof,  I  give  and 
bequeath  my  said  property  in  the  funds  at  the  Bank  of  England  the 
said  monies  to  arise  by  the  aforesaid  sales,  the  said  debts  that  shall  be 
owing  to  me  at  my  decease  and  all  other  the  said  residue  of  my  estate 
and  effects  whatsoever  unto  the  said  Francis  Russell  Palmer  Francis 
Douse  Edward  Balme  and  the  Reverend  Mr.  Kerrick  in  my  said  Will 
named  equally  to  be  divided  between  them  the  said  Francis  Russell 
Palmer  Francis  Douse  Edward  Balme  and  Mr.  Kerrick  And  I 
publish  and  declare  this  to  be  a  further  Codicil  to  my  said  Will 
Witness  my  hand  and  seal  this  twenty-ninth  day  of  January,  One 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  nineteen. 

Joseph  Nollekens,  l.s. 
Signed,  sealed,  and  published  by  the 
said  Joseph  Nollekens  in  the  pre- 
sence of  us, 

Henry  Jeanneret, 
W.  T.  Stubbs. 

No.  6. 

I  do  hereby  revoke  every  legacy  and  bequest  by  my  Will  or 
Codicils  given  to  or  in  favour  of,  Dodemy,  and  also  the  legacy  of  one 
hundred  pounds  to  Alexander  Goblet  and  instead  of  the  said  last 
legacy,  I  give  to  the  said  Alexander  Goblet  an  annuity  of  thirty 
pounds  for  his  life  to  commence  from  my  decease,  and  to  be  payable 
half-yearly.  Witness  my  hand  and  seal  the  fifteenth  day  of  April* 
1819. 

Joseph  Nollekens,  l.s. 
(Witness) 
Henry  Jeanneret. 
Joseph  Bonomi. 

No.  7. 

Mortimer  street  27th  September  1819. 

It  is  my  desire  that  my  executors  do  give  as  a  present  from  me  to 
Mrs.  Elizabeth  Gee  widow  of  No.  4,  King-street,  Golden-square  the 
sum  of  fifty  pounds,  as  a  token  of  my  regard  for  her. 

And  it  is  my  desire  that  my  executors  do  give,  in  the  same  manner 
as  above,  the  sum  of  fifty  pounds  to  Mrs.  Ray,  the  wife  of  Lieut.  Ray 
as  a  token  of  my  regard  for  her  and  her  ffamily  like  of  my  friend  Mr. 
Trumbold  in  America. 

And  it  is  my  desire  that  twenty  pounds  shall  be  given  to  Mrs. 


372 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Rouw  the  wife  of  Mr.  Rouw  the  Modler  for  the  regard  I  have  for  her, 
for  her  sole  use  and  benefit,  and  the  long  slabb  of  marble  in  my  yard 
shall  be  given  to  him  for  his  own  use.  Also,  that  young  Pastorini 
shall  be  given  twenty  pounds  as  a  token  of  my  regard  for  him. 

And  it  is  my  request  that  in  case  of  the  demise  of  my  hair 
dresser  Hancock  a  legacy  of  twenty  pounds  shall  be  given  to  his 
daughter. 

Joseph  Nollekens. 
(Signed  in  the  presence  of  me) 
John  Worninck,  D.D.  &c. 
Camberwell  Grove. 

No.  8. 

Whereas,  by  a  former  memorandum  I  had  directed  that  the  marble 
in  the  yard  and  the  working  tools  in  the  study  should  be  equally 
divided  and  one-half  of  the  same  given  to  Mr.  Alexander  Goblet  I 
do  hereby  revoke  such  former  direction  and  instead  thereof  do  hereby 
will  and  direct  that  the  whole  of  the  said  marble  and  all  the  working 
tools  in  the  study  be  delivered  by  my  Executors  to  the  said  Alexander 
Goblet  for  his  sole  use  and  benefit  in  consideration  of  his  care  and 
attention  to  me. 

And  whereas  in  the  aforesaid  memorandum,  I  had  directed  that  my 
books,  drawings  and  prints  should  be  sold  by  Mr.  King,  I  do  hereby 
direct  that  they  be  sold  by  Mr.  Evans,  of  Pall  Mall. 

Joseph  Nollekens. 

February  the  7th,  1820. 

No.  9. 

It  is  my  desier  that  I  wish  that  my  executors  will  give  as  a  presant 
the  sum  of  fifty  guineas  unto  Henry  Goblet  for  the  servises  he  has 

done  for  me. 

J.  Nollekens. 
August  14th,  1820. 

No.  10. 

All  the  working  tools  in  the  shop  I  give  to  his  father  with  the 
marble  in  the  yard  and  the  boards  and  utenserals  for  working  the  jack 
I  lent  to  Lupto  above  a  year  ago  he  ought  to  return  it  I  have  paid 
and  for  what. — 

J.  Nollekens. 

This  14th  of  August,  1820. 

No.  11. 

This  28th  day  of  January,  1822. 
Memorandum  that  in  case  of  my  death  all  the  marble  in  the  yard 
the  tools  in  the  shop  Bankers  mod  tools  for  carving  the  rasp  in  the 


CODICILS  373 


draw  with  and  the  draw  in  the  parlour  shall  be  the  property  of  Alex. 

Goblet. 

Joseph  Nollekens. 
(Witness  my  hand.) 
Mary  Holt. 

No.  12. 

Codicil  to  my  Will. 
It  is  my  request  that  the  legacy  of  fifty  pounds  per  annum  which  I 
have  left  in  my  Will,  besides  my  cloaths  and  body  linen  left  to  Mary 
Fiery,  now  Mrs.  Edmonds,  be  revoked,  and  I  give  the  said  fifty 
pounds  per  annum  to  Mary  Holt  for  her  life,  together  with  my  cloaths 
and  body  linen,  for  the  care  she  has  taken  of  me  in  my  weak  state  of 
body.  This  is  my  desire,  to  which  I  set  my  hand  and  seal,  this  thirtieth 
day  of  July,  Eighteen  Hundred  and  Twenty-two. 

Joseph  Nollekens,  l.s. 
(Witness) 
A.  H.  Chambert. 
Wm.  Gadsby. 

No.  13. 

Since  executing  this  Will,  the  Reverend  Edward  Balme,  one  of  the 
Executors  therein  named,  has  departed  this  life,  and  I  do  therefore 
appoint  as  my  Executors  Sir  William  Beechy,  Knight ;  Francis 
Douce,  Esquire  ;  and  Thomas  Smith,  Esquire,  of  the  British  Museum, 
the  joint  Executors  of  this  my  Will  ;  and  I  do  now  hereby  give  to  the 
said  Sir  William  Beechy  the  sum  of  one  hundred  pounds  for  his 
trouble,  and  to  the  said  Thomas  Smith  one  hundred  pounds  for  his 
trouble  ;  I  do  likewise  hereby  give  and  bequeath  to  Henry  Francis 
Goblet,  the  son  of  Alexander  Goblet,  one  hundred  pounds,  and  to  Mrs. 
Mary  Holt  the  additional  sum  of  one  hundred  pounds  to  what  I  may 
have  already  given  her  by  this  Will,  which  I  do  in  all  other  respects 
hereby  confirm  ;  as  witness  my  hand,  this  sixth  day  of  December,  One 
Thousand  Eight  Hundred  and  Twenty-two. 

J.  Nollekens. 

(Signed  in  the  presence  of  us) 
John  Meakin. 
Thomas  Matthew. 

No.  14. 

It  is  my  desire  that  my  Executors  pay  to  Mr.  Peter  Rouw,  the 

Modeller,  the  sum  of  one  hundred  pounds.     As  witness  my  hand,  this 

twenty-eighth  day  of  December,  One  Thousand  Eight  Hundred  and 

Twenty-two. 

Joseph  Nollekens. 

Died  April  23rd,  1823. 


[374] 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

Funeral  of  Mr.  Nollekens — His  wardrobe — List  of  his  intended 
bequests— Professional  anecdotes  of  him— Modelling  in  full  dress 
— Taking  casts  from  dead  subjects— His  mask  of  Mr.  Pitt — Statue 
erected  at  Cambridge — Mrs.  Siddons's  remarks  on  it — Economy  and 
profits  of  the  sculptor — Bust  of  Lord  Londonderry — Economy  in 
fuel — Fuseli's  opinion  of  Nollekens — His  bust  of  Mr.  Coutts  ; 
anecdotes  of  its  execution — His  collection  of  casts  and  models- 
Wigs  painted  by  Lely  and  Kneller — Wycherley  and  Fielding  wigs 
—  Old  system  of  wig-stealing — Mr.  Nollekens'  features  of  likeness 
in  his  busts — His  busts  of  Mr.  Fox. 

On  the  day  of  the  funeral,  May  1,  1823,  at  eleven 
o'clock,  the  hour  proposed  for  the  meeting  of  the 
carriages  invited  to  attend  it,  only  four  appeared, 
namely,  the  Hon.  Thomas  Grenville's,  Mr.  Cham- 
bers', Mr.  Palmer's  ;  and  last  of  all,  that  which 
the  mob  saluted  as  my  Lord  Mayor's.  The  cry 
was,  '  Lord  Mayor  !  Lord  Mayor  !'  '  Lord  Mayor  !' 
rejoined  the  stately  coachman,  drawing  on  his 
sable  glove  ;  '  the  Duke  of  Wellington's,  if  you 
please — Lord  Mayor,  indeed  !'  and  really  the  coach 
and  dressings  were  truly  splendid,  and  worthy  of 
so  noble  a  Duke.  The  Kev.  Thomas  Kerrick,1  or, 
in  true  spelling,  Kerrich,  Principal  Librarian  to  the 

1  Thomas  Kerrick,  of  Dersingham,  was  University  Librarian  from 
1797  to  his  death  in  1828,  at  the  age  of  eighty.  He  was  a  very  skilful 
architectural  and  antiquarian  draughtsman. — Ed. 


THE  FUNERAL  COACHES  375 

University  of  Cambridge,  did  not  appear.  The 
mourners  were  all  in  waiting  ;  and  Mr.  Douce 
arrived  at  twelve.  The  street-lamp-irons  and  win- 
dows were  thronged  to  see  '  The  Miser's  Funeral  ;' 
and  all  was  now  in  silent  motion. 

The  first  coach  contained  Francis  Douce,  Esq., 
an  executor,  and  one  of  the  residuary  legatees. 
Sir  William  Beechey,  also  an  executor,  but  not  a 
residuary  legatee,  was  obliged  to  attend  his  own 
interests  in  touching  up  his  pictures  in  the  Royal 
Academy  Room,  previous  to  the  opening  of  the 
Exhibition.  The  second  in  the  coach  was  the  late 
Dr.  Simmonds,  of  Chiswick,  an  old  and  steady 
friend  to  the  deceased  ;  the  third  was  Russel 
Palmer,  Esq.,  the  son  of  Mrs.  Palmer,  an  acquaint- 
ance of  some  standing  with  the  deceased  ;  and  the 
fourth  was  myself,  an  executor,  but,  like  Sir 
William  Beechey,  no  residuary  legatee.  The  other 
mourners  were,  Mr.  Woodcock,  a  cousin  of  Mrs. 
Nollekens,  to  whom  a  small  legacy  had  been  left ; 
Mr.  Nelson  Beechey,  for  his  father  -}  Mr.  Christie, 
the  auctioneer,  the  gentleman  who  sold  part  of  the 
property  ;  Raphael  and  Benjamin  West,  Esquires, 
sons  of  the  late  venerable  President  ;  the  Rev. 
Stephen  Weston  ;  Mr.  Jeanneret,  who  was  sent 
for  after  Mr.  Nollekens'  death  to  read  the  will  ; 
Mr.  Gahagan  ;  Mr.  Goblet,  sen.,  and  his  son  ;  Mr. 
Rouw,2  Mr.  Taylor,  and  Mr.  Soilleux. 

Early  on  the  day  of  the  funeral,  when  Sir 
William  Beechey  and  myself  found  that  Mr.  Peck, 

1  Sir  William  Beechey,  R.A.— Ed. 

2  Peter  Rouw,  jun.  (1771-1852),  the  gem-engraver. — Ed. 


376  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

one  of  Mr.  Nollekens'  two  nearest  relations,  had 
not  been  included  in  the  list  of  those  invited,  we 
immediately  directed  Mr.  Turner,  the  undertaker, 
to  send  a  coach  to  the  Temple  for  that  gentleman, 
but  it  arrived  too  late  for  him  to  attend. 

Being  now  in  a  state  of  motion,  the  conversation 
between  Dr.  Simmonds  and  myself  fell  upon  the 
notices  in  the  newspapers  respecting  the  very 
extraordinary  manner  in  which  it  was  stated  that 
Mr.  Nollekens'  money  was  to  be  distributed.  As 
the  coach  in  which  I  was  turned  round  Harley 
Street,  I  had  a  perfect  view  of  the  procession,  and 
the  crowd  that  followed  the  Duke  of  Wellington's 
carriage  was  immense  ;  it  was  a  new  one,  built  for 
state  occasions.  By  the  time  we  got  into  the  New 
Road,  the  concourse  of  people  was  beyond  all 
conception  ;  for  it  was  May-Day,  and  the  chimney- 
sweepers in  their  trappings,  and  the  Jacks-in-the- 
green,  or  Bunter's  Garland,  had  all  followed  what 
they  still  looked  upon  as  my  Lord  Mayor's  coach. 
Indeed,  so  strongly  was  this  believed  by  the  drivers 
of  the  Paddington  stages,  whose  horses  were  gaily 
decked  with  ribbons  of  various  dies,  that  they,  out 
of  respect  or  fear  of  the  City  Magistrate,  fell  back 
and  slowly  followed  the  Duke's  coach. 

Bv  the  time  we  had  arrived  at  the  Yorkshire 
Stingo,  a  crowd  of  milkmaids  and  maidservants, 
who  had  been  dancing  and  drinking  on  the  green 
all  the  morning,  so  choked  up  the  turnpike,  that 
for  some  time  a  stoppage  took  place.  At  last,  the 
mob  finding  it  to  be  only  a  funeral,  and  that  it 
was  going  to  Paddington,  the  greater  part  of  our 


EXECUTORS  377 

company  left  us,  to  follow  their  accustomed 
gambols.  On  our  arrival  at  the  churchyard,  Old 
Dodimy  was  waiting  to  see  the  last  of  his  master, 
with  whom  had  he  remained,  most  likely  he  would 
have  had  the  annuity  of  thirty  pounds  once 
bequeathed  him,  but  since  transferred  to  Lewis 
Goblet,  sculptor,  as  a  reward  for  his  long  and 
faithful  services.  Before  this  time,  however, 
Goblet  was  not  noticed,  though  he  had  received 
many  assurances  from  Mr.  Nollekens  that  he  had 
left  him  and  his  family  comfortably  in  his  will. 

When  the  funeral  was  over,  Mr.  Douce  returned 
from  the  churchyard  to  his  house  in  Kensington 
Square  and  most  of  the  other  mourners  returned 
to  the  house  of  the  deceased,  in  order  to  hear  the 
will  read.  This  I,  as  an  executor,  firmly  insisted 
upon,  and  it  was  accordingly  read  in  the  presence  of 
many  persons. 

Some  time  was  employed  by  two  of  the  executors 
and  the  three  solicitors,  in  looking  over  Mr.  Nolle- 
kens'  property,  before  the  will  was  proved.  At 
one  of  these  meetings,  Mr.  Nollekens'  wardrobe 
was  inspected,  when  we  found  it  to  consist  of  his 
court-coat  of  Pourpre  de  Pape,  in  which  he  was 
married  ;  his  hat,  sword,  and  bag  ;  two  shirts,  two 
pairs  of  worsted  stockings,  one  table-cloth,  three 
sheets,  and  two  pillow-cases  ;  but  all  these  were  in 
such  a  state  of  decay,  that,  with  other  rags,  Mrs. 
Holt  informed  me  she  could  only  procure  one 
pound  jive  shillings  for  her  legacy.  His  smart 
green  velvet  cap,  one  of  the  two  kindly  presented 
to  him  by  a  lady,  Mrs.  Holt  presented  to  a  friend. 


378  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

During  the  investigation  of  his  papers,  I  was  in 
anxious  expectation  of  finding  a  will  subsequent  to 
the  one  produced,  as  he  had  been  for  years  in 
the  habit  of  signing  many  wills,  in  all  of  which 
he  assured  me  he  had  recollected  me  and  my 
family,  '  That  you  may  depend  upon,  Tom,'  were  his 
words.  In  the  year  1810,  he  showed  me  a  list  of  the 
names  of  one  hundred  persons,  to  every  one  of  whom 
he  said  he  intended  to  leave  one  thousand  pounds  ! 

Mr.  Nollekens,  who  had  been  extremely  intimate 
with  Mr.  Zoffany,  when  approaching  his  eightieth 
year,  offered  his  hand  to  his  widow,  who  very 
civilly  declined  it,  prudently  observing:  c  No,  sir; 
the  world  would  then  say,  She  has  married  him  for 
his  money.'  Mrs.  Zoffany,  when  she  found  poor 
Bronze  had  been  set  down  in  his  will  for  only 
£19  19s.,  very  generously  gave  Mrs.  Holt  a  guinea 
for  her,  long  before  she  received  her  own  legacy. 

Having  illustrated  the  peculiar  manners  of  Mr. 
Nollekens  in  his  ordinary  life,  I  shall  now  intro- 
duce a  few  professional  anecdotes  of  him  as  an 
artist,  which  will  probably  be  not  less  amusing  to 
the  reader. 

During  the  time  an  illustrious  personage  was 
sitting  for  his  bust,  he  could  not  refrain  from 
smiling  at  his  friend,  who  stood  behind  Nollekens, 
at  the  truly  ridiculous  manner  in  which  the  artist 
had  inconvenienced  himself  for  the  occasion.  His 
powdered   toupet,1   which   was    stiffly  pomatumed, 

1  Mr.  Nollekens,  when  at  Rome,  wore  his  long  hair  tied  up  in  a 
club.  When  he  arrived  in  England  he  commenced  wearing  hair- 
powder,  and  continued  the  use  of  it  till  his  hair  became  thin  ;  he 


TAKING  CASTS  379 


stood  pointedly  erect  ;  and  he  had,  for  the  first 
time,  put  on  a  coat,  to  which  the  tailor  had  given 
an  enormously  high  buckramed  cape,  so  that,  like 
Allscrip's,  in  '  The  Heiress,'  his  head  appeared  as 
if  it  were  in  the  pillory.  To  look  over  this  cape, 
Nollekens  had  for  some  time  painfully  exerted 
himself,  by  stretching  his  neck  to  its  fullest  pos- 
sible extent ;  but,  as  he  proceeded  with  his  model, 
his  body  by  degrees  relaxed,  and  his  head  at  last 
was  so  completely  buried  within  the  cape,  that 
nothing  but  the  pinnacle  of  his  toupet  was  visible 
above  it.  This  ridiculous  exit  of  Nollekens'  head 
so  operated  upon  the  risibility  of  the  noble  sitter, 
that,  at  last,  he  irresistibly  indulged  in  a  liberal  fit 
of  laughter,  which  so  irritated  the  little  sculptor, 
who  had  for  some  time  noticed  their  smiles,  that, 
instead  of  good-temperedly  finding  fault  with  the 
tailor,  he  lost  sight  of  propriety,  and  thrusting  his 
thumb  into  the  mouth  of  the  model,  impetuously 
exclaimed,  with  a  treble  wag  of  his  head,  4  If  you 
laugh,  I'll  make  a  fool  of  ye  !' 

Nollekens,  after  reading  the  death  of  any  great 
person  in  the  newspaper,  generally  ordered  some 
plaster  to  be  got  ready,  so  that  he  might  attend  at 
a  minute's  notice.  One  day,  when  a  lady  who  had 
sent  for  him  desired  him  not  to  make  so  free  with 
her  dear  husband's  corpse,  he  observed,  '  Oh,  bless 
ye,  you  had  better  let  me  close  his  eyelids  ;  for 
then,  when  I  cast  him  in  my  mould,  he'll  look 
for  all  the  world  as  if  he  was  asleep.     Why  do 

then,  at  the  recommendation  of  Caleb  Whitefoord,  had  it  all  cut  off, 
and  wore  a  natural  wig  without  powder. — Smith. 


380  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

you  take  on  so  ?  you  do  wrong  to  prey  upon  such 
a  dismal  prospect  ;  do  leave  the  room  to  me  and 
my  man  ;  I  am  used  to  it,  it  makes  no  impression 
on  me  ;  I  have  got  a  good  many  noted  down  in  my 
journal.' 

Mr.  Sebastian  Gahagan,  the  sculptor,  Mr.  Nolle- 
kens'  assistant,  attended  him  to  cast  the  face  of 
Lord  Lake,  after  his  decease  ;  his  lordship's  brother 
was  then  inconsolably  pacing  the  room,  but  Mr. 
Nollekens  shook  him  by  the  elbow,  and  applied  to 
him  for  a  little  sweet- oil,  a  large  basin,  some  water, 
and  pen,  ink,  and  paper. 

The  gentleman,  astonished  at  his  want  of 
decency,  referred  him  to  the  servant ;  and  Nolle- 
kens,  after  he  had  taken  the  mask,  muttered  the 
following  soliloquy :  '  Now,  let  me  see,  I  must 
begin  to  measure  him  ;  where's  my  callipers  ?  I 
must  take  him  from  his  chin  to  the  upper  pinnacle 
of  his  head  ;  I'll  put  him  down  in  ink  ;  ay,  that  will 
do ;  now,  I  must  have  him  from  his  nose  to  the 
back  part  of  his  skull ;  well,  now  let's  take  his 
shoulders  ;  now  for  his  neck  ;  well,  now  I've  got 
him  all.' 

On  Mr.  Nollekens'  return  from  Putney  Common, 
after  taking  Mr.  Pitt's  mask,  he  observed  to  Mr. 
Gahagan,  pointing  to  it  on  the  opposite  seat  of  the 
coach  :  c  There,  I  would  not  take  fifty  guineas  for 
that  mask,  I  can  tell  ye.'  He  would  have  done 
wrong  if  he  had ;  for  from  this  mask  and  Hoppner's 
picture,  which  was  lent  him  by  Lord  Mulgrave,  he 
was  enabled  to  produce  the  statue  erected  in  the 
Senate-house  of  Cambridge,  for  which  he  received 


MONUMENT  OF  PITT  381 

three  thousand  guineas.  Mr.  Gahagan  carved  this 
statue  of  Pitt,  for  which  Mr.  Nollekens  paid  him, 
I  am  sorry  to  say,  a  miserably  small  sum  ;  and  I 
really  think,  those  who  now  bask  in  the  sunshine 
of  Mr.  Nollekens'  immense  wealth  should  take  into 
consideration  the  letter  which  he  addressed  to  the 
executors  shortly  after  the  death  of  his  old  master. 
Mr.  George  Lupton,  the  statuary,  of  Keppel 
Row,  New  Road,  informed  me  that  he  went  to 
Cambridge  with  his  men  to  put  up  Mr.  Pitt's  monu- 
ment ;  and  when  he  had  erected  the  pedestal  upon 
which  it  was  to  stand,  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Nollekens 
and  informed  him  of  its  being  ready  ;  but  as  he 
did  not  come  immediately,  Mr.  Lupton  placed  the 
figure  upon  it.  Soon  after  this  Mr.  Nollekens 
arrived,  and  exclaimed  :  4  Thank  God  !  it  is  up.' 
He  went  to  Cambridge  in  a  verv  shabbv  coat,  not- 

O  1/1/ 

withstanding  he  intended  to  accept  the  invitation  of 
the  heads  of  the  University,  and  to  feed  upon  what 
Lupton  called  '  the  fat  of  the  land '  ;  the  Rev. 
Thomas  Kerrick  being  one  of  his  feeders.  It  is 
said  that  Nollekens  charged  £1,000  for  Pitt's 
pedestal  ;  but  Lupton  assured  me  that  he  had  only 
£12  for  the  working  expenses,  and  that  Nollekens 
bought  the  stone  remarkably  cheap  at  Mr.  Deval's 
sale,  he  thinks  at  about  nine  shillings  the  cube  foot. 
He  also  farther  observed  that  Chantrey  was  nothing 
to  Nollekens,  with  respect  to  his  charges. 

The  erection  of  this  effigy  was  thus  noticed  by 
Prince  Hoare,  Esq.,  in  his  Academic  Annals  of 
1809  :  '  Statue  of  the  Right  Hon.  William  Pitt,  to 
be  placed  in  the  Senate-house  in  the  University  of 


382  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Cambridge,  by  general  subscription  of  the  Mem- 
bers of  the  University.  (Executed  by  Joseph 
Nollekens,  R.A.)  This  great  statesman  and  orator 
is  represented  in  the  act  of  speaking,  holding  a  roll 
of  paper  in  his  left  hand.  The  attitude  is  designed 
to  convey  an  idea  of  that  commanding  energy  and 
decision  with  which  he  was  accustomed  to  address 
the  House  of  Commons.  He  is  habited  in  the 
gown  worn  by  the  Masters  of  Arts  in  the  University. 
The  statue  is  to  be  erected  in  the  Senate-house,  at 
the  eastern  end  of  the  room,  in  the  place  where  the 
figure  of  Glory  at  present  stands.' 

'  The  Guide  through  the  University  of  Cam- 
bridge,' published  in  1814,  after  describing  the 
statue  of  the  Duke  of  Somerset  by  Eysbrack, 
states,  c  that  on  the  right  is  a  statue  of  the  Right 
Hon.  W.  Pitt,  erected  at  the  expense  of  different 
Members  of  the  University,  upwards  of  £7,000 
being  subscribed  for  that  purpose.  This  statue 
was  executed  by  Nollekens,  and  is  considered  by 
many  good  judges  to  be  his  chef-d'oeuvre.' 

Mr.  Knight,  one  of  the  principal  superintendents 
of  the  works  at  the  New  London  Bridge,  informed 
me  that  when  Mrs.  Siddons  arrived  to  look  at  this 
statue,  Mr.  Nollekens  was  touching  up  the  drapery, 
and  that  he  heard  that  lady  remark  to  the  sculptor 
that,  in  her  opinion,  he  was  frittering  the  folds. 
Nollekens  at  first  replied  only  by  a  kind  of  double 
grunt  ;  but  when  that  lady  left  the  studio  he 
declared  that  he  was  glad  she  was  gone,  for  she 
knew  nothing  about  the  matter.  Now,  in  the 
opinion  of  several  artists  of  eminence,  Mrs.  Siddons, 


MONUMENTS  383 


who  has  very  fine  taste,  and  a  considerable  share  of 
talent  as  a  modeller,  was  perfectly  correct.  Many 
of  my  readers  may  remember  the  head  of  Adam, 
which  Mrs.  Siddons  exhibited  at  the  Koyal  Academy 
some  years  back  j1  but  very  few  can  recollect  that 
performance  with  more  pleasure  than  myself. 

When  Mr.  Nollekens  had  finished  the  monument 
of  the  three  Captains,  ordered  by  Government  to 
be  erected  in  Westminster  Abbey,  it  remained  in 
his  studio  for  nearly  fourteen  years,  waiting  for 
the  inscription  ;  and  he  being  at  last  out  of  all 
patience,  petitioned  the  late  King,  then  at  Wey- 
mouth, to  take  it  into  his  roval  consideration.  The 
late  Mr.  Pitt  was  so  highly  displeased  at  his  inter- 
ference that  he  never  would  sit  to  Mr.  Nollekens 
for  his  bust,  nor  recommend  him  in  any  way  what- 
ever ;  and  yet  it  is  a  fact  that,  after  the  decease  of 
that  great  statesman,  Mr.  Nollekens  made  no  less 
a  sum  by  him  than  £15,000,  according  to  the  follow- 
ing calculation.  The  statue  and  pedestal  for  Trinity 
College,  Cambridge,  £4,000. 

He  also  executed  at  least  seventy-four  busts  in 
marble,  for  almost  every  one  of  which  he  had  one 
hundred  and  twenty  guineas ;  and  there  were 
upwards  of  six  hundred  casts  taken  at  six  guineas 
each.  The  marble  for  the  figure  did  not  ultimately 
cost  him  more  than  £20 ;  for  he  had  so  cunningly 
economized  the  block  that  he  cut  from  the  corners 
several  pieces  for  various  busts  :  and  even  farther 
than  this,  the  block  not  being  long  enough  by  the 
depth  of  Mr.  Pitt's  head,  he  contrived  to  drill  out 

1  In  the  year  1802.— Ed. 


384  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

a  lump  from  between  the  legs  large  enough  for  the 
head,  which  he  put  on  the  shoulders  of  the  block. 
The  arm  was  also  carved  from  a  single  piece ;  and 
yet  for  this  figure,  pieced  in  a  manner  which  the 
sculptors  of  Italy  would  have  been  ashamed  of ,  he 
received  the  unheard-of  price  of  three  thousand 
guineas,  and  one  thousand  for  the  pedestal ;  giving 
the  sculptor  who  carved  it  only  the  odd  £300  for 
his  trouble.  For  the  busts  in  marble  he  paid 
Gahagan,  Goblet,  and  another  sculptor  of  inferior 
merit,  £24  each  upon  the  average. 

When  the  late  Marquis  of  Londonderry  was 
sitting  for  his  bust,  coals  were  at  an  enormous 
price  ;  and  the  noble  lord,  who  had  been  for  some 
time  shivering  in  his  seat,  took  the  opportunity, 
when  the  sculptor  went  out  for  more  clay,  of 
throwing  some  coals  upon  the  fire.  '  Oh,  my  good 
lord  !  I  don't  know  what  Mr.  Nollekens  will  say  V 
exclaimed  Mrs.  Nollekens,  who  was  bolstered  up 
and  bound  to  an  old  night-chair  by  the  fireside. 
4  Never  mind,  my  good  lady,'  answered  his  lord- 
ship ;  '  tell  him  to  put  them  into  my  bill.' 
Lonsdale,1  the  portrait-painter,  who  found  him  one 
severe  winter's  evening  starving  himself  before  a 
handful  of  fire,  requested  to  be  permitted  to  throw 
a  few  coals  on ;  and  before  Mr.  Nollekens  could 
reply,  on  they  were. 

Lonsdale,  strongly  suspecting  that  they  would  be 
taken  off  as  soon  as  he  was  gone,  was  determined 
to   be  convinced  ;    and  when   he  had  reached  the 

1  James   Lonsdale  (1777-1839).     He  took  Opie's   house,  and  suc- 
ceeded to  part  of  his  practice. — Ed. 


BUST  OF  COUTTS  385 


street-door,  pretended  to  have  forgotten  something, 
reascended  to  the  room,  and  found  him,  as  he 
suspected,  taking  them  off  with  the  fire-feeder,  so 
strongly  recommended  to  him  by  the  Bishop  of 
St.  Asaph,  at  the  same  time  muttering  to  himself: 
c  Shameful !  shameful  extravagance !'  He  never 
left  the  kind-hearted  Lonsdale  a  legacy  ;  at  least,  I 
know  of  none,  though  it  was  his  intention  to  have 
put  him  down  in  a  former  will  for  £1,000. 

John  Knowles,  Esq.,  the  friend,  and  for  many 
years  the  constant  companion,  of  Fuseli,  com- 
municated to  me  the  remarks  which  that  artist 
made  to  him  respecting  the  talents  of  Nollekens. 

'  Mr.  Coutts  said  to  me  yesterday,'  observed 
Fuseli,  '  "  My  family  have  urged  me  to  sit  for  a  bust 
to  be  executed  in  marble.  Now,  as  you  know, 
Fuseli,  that  the  price  is  not  an  object,  pray  tell  me 
who  you  think  will  execute  it  best  ?"  I  had  no 
difficulty  in  doing  this,  for,  though  Nollekens  is 
superannuated  in  many  particulars,  yet  in  a  bust 
he  stands  unrivalled.  If  Mr.  Coutts  had  required 
a  group  of  figures,  I  should  have  recommended 
Flaxman,  but  for  a  bust,  give  me  Nollekens.' 

This  bust  of  the  late  Mr.  Coutts,  the  banker,  was 
one  of  Nollekens'  last  productions,  and  one  in 
which  he  appeared  to  take  much  pleasure,  but  I 
must  say  that,  as  to  likeness,  it  is  certainly 
ridiculously  severe.  In  my  mind,  it  displays  the 
distorted  features  of  a  distressed  person  labouring 
under  the  heavy  pangs  of  poverty,  penury,  or 
peevishness,  neither  of  which  cheerless  character- 
istics  did   Mr.    Coutts   at   any   period   of   his  life 

25 


386  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

possess.  Indeed,  it  is  what  I  deem  a  Cruikshank- 
caricature  countenance.  Chantrey  has  succeeded 
much  better,  and,  indeed,  completely,  in  his  statue 
of  him.  This  statue  is  placed  in  the  Duchess  of 
St.  Alban's  drawing-room,  in  her  Grace's  town- 
house,  Piccadilly.  Mrs.  Nollekens  assured  me  that 
during  the  numerous  sittings  which  that  wealthy 
man  gave  Mr.  Nollekens,  no  one  could  be  more 
attentive  to  him  than  Mrs.  Coutts,  who  never  failed 
to  bring  with  her  in  her  carriage  some  of  the  most 
delicious  and  comforting  soups  or  refreshments 
that  could  possibly  be  made,  which  she  herself 
warmed  in  a  saucepan  over  the  parlour  fire  :  '  and 
I  declare,  my  good  sir,'  continued  Mrs.  Nollekens, 
'  I  believe  it  did  me  as  much  good  to  see  old  Mr. 
Coutts  enjoy  every  spoonful  of  it  as  it  would  have 
done  had  it  passed  through  my  own  mouth.' 

These  savoury-soup  scenes  must  have  been 
comically  curious,  as  well  as  truly  melancholy  ;  for 
at  that  time  Mrs.  Nollekens  was  in  her  last  stage 
of  existence,  with  her  spine  nearly  bent  double. 
A  wry  neck  had  much  twisted  her  head,  which,  in 
the  best  possible  position,  reclined  upon  a  wing  of 
a  nurse's  old-fashioned  high-backed  night-chair, 
covered  with  a  broad  chequered  red  and  white 
stuff;  and  her  swollen  legs,  which  were  almost 
useless,  were  placed  upon  a  stool  for  the  day  by 
her  '  flesh-brush  rubber,'  a  woman  who  regularly 
attended  her  for  an  hour  every  morning.  In  the 
latter  part  of  Mrs.  Nollekens'  life  her  husband 
would  frequently  make  drawings  of  her,  either  in 
her  chair,  or  as  her  maid  was  leading  her  up  or 


COUTTS  387 


down  stairs  ;  these  sketches  he  showed  to  Mr. 
Jackson,  observing  to  him,  even  in  her  presence, 
4  Only  see  how  much  she  has  altered  in  a  short 
time  !  That  drawing  I  made  in  July,  and  this  in 
August.'  '  Ay,  sir,'  observed  Mrs.  Nollekens,  who 
was  almost  bent  double  in  the  great  arm-chair, 
'  you  never  would  make  a  drawing  of  me  when  I 
was  fit  to  be  seen.'  Mr.  Coutts  was  blowing  his 
broth,  attended  by  Mrs.  Coutts,  a  lively  woman, 
most  fashionably  dressed :  whilst  Nollekens,  to  use 
the  commonest  of  all  similes,  nearly  as  deaf  as 
a  post,  was  prosecuting  his  bust,  and  at  the  same 
time  repeating  his  loud  interrogations  as  to  the 
price  of  stocks  to  his  sitter,  who  had  twice  most 
good-temperedly  stayed  the  spoon  when  it  was  con- 
siderably more  than  half-way  to  his  mouth,  and 
turned  his  head  to  answer  him.  As  for  the  old 
conversation  upon  his  early  amusement  of  bell- 
tolling,  that  was  a  pleasure  our  artist  had  given  up 
ever  since  he  became  a  patient  of  the  celebrated 
aurist,  Mr.  Maule,  who  advised  him  by  all  means 
to  keep  his  ears  well  stuffed  with  cotton. 

Mr.  Henning,1  the  sculptor,  when  employed  by 
Lady  Moira  to  make  a  model  in  wax  from  Lord 
Moira's  bust  by  Nollekens,  was  under  the  necessity 
of  ^oino;  to  the  artist's  house  to  take  the  likeness, 
and  he  was  in  hope,  from  a  man  standing  so  high 
in  his  profession,  that  he  should  derive  considerable 
benefit  from  his  conversation  ;  but  in  this  expecta- 
tion he  was,  after  repeatedly  trying  to  bring  him 
into  discourse,  most  grievously  disappointed.     Mr. 

1  John  Henning  (1771-1851).— Ed. 


388  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

Henning  had  been  previously  introduced  to  Mr. 
Nollekens  by  his  old  friend,  James  Dawkins,  Esq., 
who  would  now  and  then  joke  him  as  to  his 
Venuses.  Mr.  Henning  informed  me,  that  Mr. 
Dawkins  assured  him  that  his  uncle's  work  of 
Palmyra  and  Balbeck  had  cost  him  no  less  a  sum 
than  £50,000,  his  attendants  in  the  deserts  being  so 
numerous  that  he  seldom  had  fewer  than  three 
hundred  men  to  protect  him  and  assist  in  his  dis- 
coveries. Surely  this  noble  enterprise  demands 
the  most  liberal  notice  of  the  future  biographer  of 
Mr.  Dawkins. 

Fiamingo's  models  of  boys  were  great  favourites 
with  Mr.  Nollekens  :  he  had  several  originals  in 
clay,  which  he  procured  from  Antwerp,  and  upon 
which  he  placed  so  high  a  value  that,  though 
frequent  and  considerable  offers  were  made,  he 
would  not  part  with  them.  Indeed,  he  would  not 
even  listen  to  his  nattering  friend  Angelica  Kauff- 
mann,  who  practised  her  wheedlings  to  the  fullest 
extent  of  her  fascinating  powers  to  become  mistress 
of  only  one  of  the  most  inferior  of  his  collection. 

He  laid  out  little  money  in  England  for  plaster 
casts,  for  most  of  those  he  possessed  he  brought 
from  Rome,  unless  Papera,  who  in  the  commence- 
ment of  his  career  carried  the  new  things  round 
to  the  artists  in  baskets,  brought  him  a  Fiamingo 
child  which  he  had  never  seen.  I  recollect  a  basso- 
relievo  of  boys  which  he  admired  very  much  until 
Papera  named  John  Deare  as  the  modeller,  when 
his  admiration,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  decreased  into 
the  following  remarks  :  '  Yes,  it  is  ;  he  is  a  clever 


WIGS  IN  SCULPTURE  389 

fellow,  certainly,  but  I  don't  see  the  wonderful 
merit  in  his  Marine  Venus  that  Sir  Eichard 
Worsley  talks  so  much  about  ;  and  there's  Mr. 
Penn,  with  his  Landing  of  Julius  Caesar,  it's  a 
clever  thing,  and  so  I  have  always  told  him.' 

Nollekens,  whenever  he  could  contrive  it,  avoided 
a  representation  of  flowing  hair  in  marble,  particu- 
larly in  curled  wigs,  though  in  his  bust  of  Lord 
Chancellor  Bathurst  he  was  obliged  to  attend 
strictly  to  costume.  The  manner  in  which  the  wig 
of  that  bust  is  modelled  proves  what  I  firmly 
believe  to  be  the  fact,  that  such  profusion  of  hair 
either  perplexed  him  or  was  too  expensive  in  the 
workmanship.  Indeed,  his  master,  Scheemakers, 
never  shone  in  the  art  of  wig-making,  as  his  bust 
of  Sir  Hans  Sloane  in  the  British  Museum  suffici- 
ently proves.  His  predecessor,  Bird,  in  the  wig  of 
Sir  Cloudesley  Shovel  in  Westminster  Abbey,  bad 
as  it  is,  was  more  successful  in  its  tooling.  That 
of  Dr.  Lockyer,  in  Saint  Mary  Overies,  and  those 
on  the  statues  of  Sir  John  Cutler,  in  the  College 
of  Physicians  and  Grocers'  Hall,  are  very  little 
superior. 

Koubiliac's  statue  of  Sir  John  Cass,  at  Saint 
Botolph's,  Aldgate,  exhibits  a  particularly  tasteful 
wig  j1  but,  notwithstanding  his  skill  displayed  in 
that  instance,  he  was  not  fond  of  introducing  it, 
and  endeavoured  to  persuade  his  sitters  to  take 
their  wigs   off.     His  busts  of   Pope,  Lord  Boling- 

1  This  fine  statue  has  lately  been  most  villainously  painted  of 
various  colours,  in  order  to  make  it  appear  as  natural  as  life,  or  like 
the  Westminster  Abbey  waxwork. — Smith. 


39o  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

broke,  Martin  Folkes,  Doctors  Mead  and  Frewin, 
and  numerous  others  of  men  of  literature,  are 
without  wigs.  Jonathan  Richardson  has  etched 
his  own  portrait  and  that  of  Lord  Somers  in  flow- 
ing wigs,  and  these  two  prints  exhibit  more  flow  of 
curl  and  spirit  of  needle  than  any  I  can  instance. 
Indeed,  they  are  complete  specimens  of  tasteful 
flowing  hair,  and  yet  Richardson  has  also  etched 
his  own  head,  and  many  more  of  Lord  Bolingbroke 
and  Pope,  without  wigs,  which  proves  that  he  pre- 
ferred the  natural  shape  of  the  head. 

Nollekens'  bust  of  Dr.  Johnson  is  without  his 
wig,  but  with  very  thick  and  heavy  locks,  which 
much  displeased  the  doctor,  who  insisted  upon  it 
that  all  persons  should  be  portrayed  as  they  are 
seen  in  company  ;  adding,  that  though  a  man  for 
ease  may  wear  a  night-cap  in  his  own  chamber,  he 
ought  not  to  look  like  one  who  had  taken  physic. 
I  recollect  that  Wilkie,  the  Academician,  once 
observed  to  an  artist  who  was  about  to  paint  his 
own  portrait  without  his  cravat,  with  his  shirt- 
collar  thrown  open  to  exhibit  his  neck,  c  Oh,  don't 
do  that  ;  you'll  look  as  if  you  were  going  to  be 
shaved.' 

In  the  representation  of  hair,  the  spirited  painter 
has  a  decided  superiority  over  the  most  exquisite 
and  dexterous  sculptor  ;  not  only  in  colour  and 
texture,  but  also  as  to  time.  The  former  is 
enabled  to  produce  in  one  hour  with  his  elastic  and 
oily  pencil  as  much  as  would  take  the  latter  six 
weeks  with  his  chisel  and  drill  ;  as  may  be  seen  in 
the  beautifully  flowing  hair  of  Vandyke,  Dobson, 


WIGS  391 


Lely,  and  Kneller,  and  the  laboured  works  of  the 
best  sculptors.  The  difference  in  a  Lely  wig  from 
that  of  a  Kneller,  is  that  the  former  generally  falls 
down  the  shoulders  in  front,  and  the  latter  is 
thrown  over  the  shoulders  behind. 

It  must,  however,  be  understood,  that  though 
Kneller  and  Lely  thus  differed,  they  did  not  paint 
all  their  sitters  according  to  their  own  fashion  of 
wearing  their  wigs.  On  the  contrary,  we  find  by 
Blooteling's  print  of  Thomas,  Earl  of  Danby,  that 
his  wig  was  peculiar.  At  the  bottom  of  the  sides 
of  the  wig,  which  falls  over  the  front  of  the 
shoulders,  there  are  three  regularly  distinct  curls 
stiffly  rolled  up.  But  of  all  the  wig-dandies  of 
those  days,  the  Duke  of  Ormond  appears  to  have 
been  the  most  fanciful  ;  and  I  am  supported  in 
this  conjecture  by  the  four  different  portraits  of 
that  nobleman,  engraven  by  Faithorne,  Loggan, 
Williams,  and  White  ;  which,  though  they  all 
have  large  and  flowing  wigs,  conspicuously  vary  in 
their  modes  of  curling. 

It  may  possibly  be  within  the  recollection  of 
some  few  of  my  readers,  when  gentlemen  indulged 
in  an  immensely  expensive  purchase  of  deep  and 
flowing  curled  wigs,  such  as  Wycherley  and  '  Beau 
Fielding '  wore  ;  and  I  have  been  credibly  in- 
formed, that  the  enormous  sum  of  fifty  guineas 
was  given  by  the  best-dressing  men  of  the  time 
for  a  truly  fashionable  wig  of  the  above  descrip- 
tion. Such  wigs  continued  to  be  worn  by  many 
men  of  the  old  school  during  the  latter  part  of 
the  profession  of  Zincke,  the  enamel-painter,  whose 


392  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

portraits  exhibit  many  of  them.  Sir  James  Thorn- 
hill  and  Jonathan  Richardson  wore  flowing  wigs, 
and  so  likewise  did  Sir  James'  son-in-law,  Hogarth, 
in  the  early  part  of  his  professional  career.  In  the 
latter  years  of  his  life,  he  wore  a  Busby  wig  when 
dressed  ;  though,  whilst  painting,  he  preferred  a 
velvet  cap.  There  are  persons  now  living  who 
recollect  seeing  the  father  of  the  late  Mr.  Prime, 
of  Witton,1  wearing  a  flowing  wig,  or  what  is 
better  known  in  the  burletta  of  c  Tom  Thumb '  as  a 
Doodle  and  a  Noodle. 

Mrs.  Nollekens  has  frequently  been  heard  to 
relate,  that  during  the  early  part  of  Mr.  Welch's 
magistracy,  gentlemen  were  continually  annoyed, 
and  frequently  robbed  of  their  wigs  in  the  open 
street  and  in  mid-day.  She  stated  that  this  method 
of  wig- stealing  was  singularly  daring,  as  well  as 
laughably  curious.  A  man  dressed  like  a  baker, 
bending  beneath  a  large,  loaded  bread-basket, 
which  he  had  hoisted  upon  his  shoulders,  waited 
until  the  first  gentleman  wearing  a  costly  wig  was 
about  to  turn  the  corner  of  a  street  in  a  crowded 
thoroughfare  ;  and  then,  just  as  an  accomplice  ran 
forcibly  against  him,  a  boy  concealed  in  the  baker's 
basket  knocked  off  the  gentleman's  gold-laced  hat, 
and  instantly  snatched  his  wig.  Whilst  the  gentle- 
man was  stooping  to  pick  up  his  hat,  the  fictitious 
baker  made  off,  with  his  dexterous  assistant,  till 
he  came  to  the  first  convenient  turning,  where  he 

1  This  gentleman  resided  in  the  house  which  had  been  the  mansion 
of  Sir  Godfrey  Kneller,  the  staircase  of  which,  painted  by  that  artist, 
remains  perfectly  in  its  original  state. — Smith. 


BUSTS  OF  FOX  393 


released  the  boy,  who  walked  away  with  his  booty 
neatly  folded  up  in  a  school- boy's  satchel,  which 
he  threw  carelessly  over  his  shoulder,  as  if  slowly 
going  to  school,  with  his  round,  c  shining  morning 
face ;'  leaving  the  baker  with  a  loaf  or  two  in  his 
basket,  pretending  to  be  waiting  at  a  customer's 
door,  at  which  it  was  supposed  he  had  knocked. 

After  numerous  depredations  of  this  kind,  the 
bakers'  men,  who  were  avoided  by  the  Wycher- 
leys,1  were  determined  not  to  be  mistaken,  and 
no  longer  carried  their  baskets  hoisted  on  their 
shoulders,  but  swung  them  over  the  arm,  and  have 
ever  since  carried  them  at  their  backs  ;  so  that  the 
wearers  of  wigs  might  see  the  contents  of  their 
bread-baskets. 

But  to  return  to  our  sculptor.  In  my  opinion, 
Mr.  Nollekens  trusted  more  to  the  eyes,  nose,  and 
mouth  for  a  likeness,  than  to  the  bones  of  the 
head  ;  and  in  this  belief  I  am  supported  most 
powerfully  by  the  mask  taken  from  Mr.  Fox  after 
his  death.  Mr.  Nollekens  modelled  and  carved 
two  different  busts  of  Mr.  Fox.  The  first  was 
with  a  toupet  and  curls   above  the  ears,  as  that 

1  From  Smith's  portrait  of  Wycherley,  engraven  in  1703,  we  may 
conclude  that  he  was,  as  reported,  a  very  handsome  man,  and,  by  the 
sleekness  of  the  curls  of  his  wig,  that  he  took  great  pains  with  it  ; 
indeed,  so  much  was  it  the  fashion  to  attend  to  the  easy  grace  of  the 
curls,  that  it  was  his  custom,  while  standing  in  the  pit  of  the  theatre 
conversing  with  ladies  in  the  boxes,  to  comb  and  adjust  his  discom- 
posed locks.  Wig-combs,  which  were  made  of  most  beautiful  speci- 
mens of  tortoiseshell,  and  most  fancifully  engraven  with  representations 
of  flowers  and  birds,  and,  indeed,  sometimes  inlaid  with  mother-of- 
pearl  with  their  owners'  names,  were  contained  in  a  side-pocket  case 
of  the  size  of  a  thin  octavo  volume,  for  the  purpose  of  having  them 
always  about  their  persons. — Smith. 


394  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

gentleman  wore  his  hair  about  1783,  just  as  Sir 
Joshua  Reynolds  has  painted  him  ;  of  which  bust 
there  are  several  engravings,  the  carving  being  by 
T.  Gaugain.1  The  second  bust  is  with  his  hair  cut 
close  ;  and  of  this  there  are  two  plates  :  one  by 
Skelton,  for  the  small  edition  of  Fox's  c  Life  of 
King  James  the  Second,'  and  the  other  by  Evans, 
from  a  beautiful  drawing  by  Mr.  Howard,  for  the 
large  edition  of  the  same  work.  Of  the  mask 
taken  by  Nollekens  after  death,  I  am  not  aware  of 
there  being  any  engraving  ;  ghastly  as  it  is,  and 
totally  unlike  as  the  features  are  to  those  of  Mr. 
Fox  when  living,  still  the  shape  of  the  forehead  is 
truly  remarkable  and  interesting.  In  his  busts  of 
that  statesman,  the  foreheads  are  low  and  rugged  ; 
whilst  that  of  the  mask  is  even,  high,  and  pro- 
minent, full  of  dignified  grandeur,  and  more  so, 
perhaps,  with  the  exception  of  Lord  Bacon,  than 
that  of  any  other  statesman  of  equal  celebrity. 
The  reader  may  be  convinced  of  the  correctness  of 
this  remark  by  visiting  Mr.  Deville's  Gallery  in 
the  Strand,  where  there  are  casts  taken  from  both 
examples. 

1  Thomas  Gaugain  (1748-1802  ?)  was  a  French  engraver,  settled  in 
London. — Ed. 


[  395  ] 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

Sale  of  Mr.  Nollekens'  collection  of  sculpture — Mending  antiques — 
Sale  of  his  prints,  etc. — Account  of  his  seated  female  figure — 
Patrons  of  modern  English  sculptors — Antique  foot — Sir  Joshua 
Reynolds'  throne-chair — List  of  busts,  monuments,  and  statues 
executed  by  Nollekens — Chronological  list  of  all  his  sculptures 
exhibited  at  the  Royal  Academy,  from  1771  to  1816— Conclusion. 

The  sale  of  Mr.  Nollekens'  unsold  works,  and 
collection  of  antique  and  modern  sculptures,  took 
place  under  the  hammer  of  Mr.  Christie,  on  the 
premises  in  Mortimer  Street,  on  Thursday,  July  3, 
1823,  and  at  the  auctioneer's  rooms  in  Pall  Mall, 
on  the  two  days  following.  The  collection  con- 
sisted of  many  of  Mr.  Nollekens'  original  models, 
carvings  in  marble,  and  works  by  Italian  and  other 
artists,  particularly  Michael  Angelo  and  Fiamingo. 
Mr.  Nollekens'  statue  of  a  standing  Venus  in 
marble,  pouring  ambrosia  on  her  hair,  was  pur- 
chased by  Mrs.  Palmer  for  £231  ;a  and  his  model 
of  a  sitting  Venus  was  bought  by  the  Earl  of 
Egremont.  The  antique  marbles  consisted  of  a 
statue    of   Minerva,  a   noble   bust   of    Commodus, 

1  This  figure  is  by  no  means  so  good  as  the  one  of  Venus  chiding 
Cupid,  executed  by  the  same  artist  for  his  liberal  patron  Lord  Yar- 
borough. — Smith. 


396  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

in  perfect  condition,  and  several  other  Imperial 
busts  ;  one  of  Mercury,  and  a  very  spirited  head  of 
a  faun,  chiefly  purchased  at  the  sales  of  the  late 
B.  Bond  Hopkins,  Esq.,  at  Pain's  Hill,  and  at  the 
Earl  of  Be[s]sborough's,  at  Boehampton.  These 
antiques,  which  were  mostly  purchased  by  the 
Duke  of  Newcastle,  brought  full  thirtv  times  the 
money  they  had  cost  Mr.  Nollekens.  His  method 
of  mending  antiques  was  rather  curious  :  he  would 
mix  the  dust  of  the  sort  of  stone  he  was  mending 
with  his  plaster  ;  so  that  when  dry,  if  the  antiques 
were  of  Pentallic  marble,  the  sparkling  of  the 
stone-dust  in  a  great  measure  disguised  the  joining 
or  mended  parts.  Mr.  Boubiliac,  when  he  had 
to  mend  a  broken  antique,  would  mix  grated 
Gloucester  cheese  with  his  plaster,  adding  the 
grounds  of  porter  and  the  yolk  of  an  egg  ;  which 
mixture,  when  dry,  forms  a  very  hard  cement. 

Mr.  Nollekens'  prints,  drawings,  and  books  of 
prints,  were  sold  by  M.  Evans,  in  Pall  Mall,  on 
Thursday,  December  4,  1823.  They  principally 
consisted  of  nearly  the  entire  works  of  Nicolas 
Poussin  ;  a  fine  collection  of  the  engravings  after 
Sir  Joshua  Reynolds'  pictures ;  several  sketch- 
books filled  by  Mr.  Nollekens  when  at  Borne,  and 
numerous  drawings  also  by  him,  made  upon  the 
backs  of  letters. 

Nollekens'  figure  with  the  sandal,  carved  for 
Lord  Yarborough,  was  considerably  the  greatest 
favourite  with  the  public  of  all  his  female  figures  ; 
but  that  which  he  himself  took  the  greatest  delight 
in  showing,  was  seated  with  her  arms  round  her 


STATUES  397 


legs,  Lot  21,  purchased  at  his  sale  at  Mr.  Christie's, 
by  the  Earl  of  Egremont,  for  the  sum  of  £84  ;  his 
lordship  giving  it  the  preference  to  other  works 
by  the  same  artist.  He  engaged  Mr.  Kossi,  the 
Academician,  to  execute  it  in  marble,  with  strict 
injunctions  that  no  alterations  whatever,  not  even  an 
improvement  upon  the  model,  should  be  attempted. 
In  giving  this  order,  his  lordship  was,  in  my  humble 
opinion,  perfectly  correct ;  for,  if  improvements  had 
been  made,  it  could  no  longer  have  been  esteemed 
as  a  production  of  Nollekens'  mind  ;  though  I  am 
perfectly  convinced,  that  had  the  figure  been  carved 
under  his  own  eye,  it  would  in  many  instances  have 
been  benefited  by  those  corrections  which  most 
sculptors  are  induced  to  make  whilst  they  are 
executing  finished  carvings  from  their  models. 

Mr.  Williams,1  who  carved  this  figure  under  the 
superintendence  of  Mr.  Rossi,  assured  me  that  in 
no  instance  could  he  have  been  engaged  upon  a 
more  difficult  task,  especially  in  carving  parts  that 
were  so  intricately  undercut ;  as  the  right  hand  of 
the  figure  placed  before  the  right  leg,  was  within  a 
quarter  of  an  inch  of  the  shin-bone,  and  he  had  to 
invent  tools  of  the  most  singular  shapes  to  enable 
him  to  cut  and  file  away  the  stone.  It  was  the 
opinion  of  most  artists,  that  many  parts  of  this 
figure  could  have  been  much  improved :  they 
thought  the  ankles  unquestionably  too  thick  ;  and 
that,  to  have  given  it  an  air.  of  the  antique,  the 
right  thigh  wanted  flesh  to  fill  up  the  ill-formed 

1  Probably  John  Thomas  Williams,  a  gem  engraver,  who  undertook 
some  sculpture  of  a  secondary  character. — Ed. 


398  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

nature  which  Nollekens  had  strictly  copied.  The 
abdomen  was  far  from  good  ;  and  the  face  was  too 
old,  and  of  a  common  character  ;  but  the  back  was 
considered  extremely  beautiful.  The  attitude  was 
a  natural  one,  and  acquired  by  mere  chance,  as 
good  attitudes  often  are. 

The  woman  from  whom  it  was  modelled,  after 
standing  for  some  time  to  Mr.  Nollekens  for  parts 
of  a  figure  on  which  he  was  then  engaged,  was 
desired  to  dress  ;  and,  upon  her  seating  herself  on 
the  ground,  to  put  on  her  stockings,  her  posture  so 
pleased  the  sculptor,  that  he  immediately  cried, 
'  Stop  !  don't  move  ;  I  must  model  you  as  you  now 
sit  !'  and  it  is  a  curious  fact,  that  he,  being  at  that 
time  Visitor  of  the  Eoyal  Academy,  placed  the 
woman  who  sat  as  the  model  there  precisely  in 
the  same  position.  It  is  also  rather  singular,  that 
the  above-mentioned  Mr.  Williams,  who  carved  the 
figure  for  Mr.  Rossi,  is  in  possession  of  a  drawing 
made  by  his  father  at  the  Academy,  from  the 
female  who  was  so  placed. 

When  Mr.  Nollekens  had  completed  this  model, 
the  late  Earl  of  Carlisle  purchased  it,  with  an 
intention  of  having  it  carved  in  marble,  and  placed 
with  the  numerous  other  works  of  art  at  Castle 
Howard  ;  but  upon  some  family  objections  being 
made,  his  lordship  gave  the  artist  a  portion  of  the 
purchase-money  to  resign  his  bargain,  and  it 
actually  remained  unsold  for  many  years  previous 
to  the  death  of  our  sculptor.  It  is  now,  however, 
honoured  with  a  pedestal  at  Petworth,  amidst 
numerous    specimens    of    modern    Art,    of    which 


PATRONAGE  OF  SCULPTURE  399 

Lord  Egremont,  to  his  eternal  honour  be  it  spoken, 
is  a  most  liberal  encourager.  This  nobleman  is 
not  only  in  possession  of  Mr.  Kossi's  beautiful 
group  of  Celadon  and  Amelia,  but,  I  am  happy  to 
state,  has  also  commissioned  the  same  artist  to 
execute  another  figure  for  him.  His  lordship  will 
likewise  have  the  good  fortune  to  possess  the  group 
of  the  Angel  Michael  and  Satan,  one  of  the 
grandest  works  of  the  late  Professor  Flaxman,  and 
perhaps  equal  to  the  productions  of  this,  or  any 
age  of  former  times.  The  modern  sculptors,  how- 
ever, are  not  only  indebted  to  the  patronage  of  the 
above  nobleman,  but  also  to  that  of  their  Graces 
the  Dukes  of  Devonshire,  Bedford  and  Newcastle, 
who  are  in  possession  of  some  of  the  finest  speci- 
mens of  their  abilities.  Indeed,  our  sculptors  of 
talent  have  so  glorious  a  patron  in  his  most 
gracious  Majesty,1  that  the  greatest  part  of  the 
nobility  and  persons  of  opulence  endeavour  to  vie 
with  each  other  in  the  decoration  of  their  halls  and 
galleries  ;  and  in  a  few  years,  it  may  reasonably  be 
expected,  the  mansions  of  wealthy  Englishmen  will 
exhibit  such  a  display  of  native  talent,  that  it  will 
at  once  astonish  and  confound  most  of  our  Conti- 
nental visitors  and  rivals. 

Sir  Thomas  Lawrence  is  the  fortunate  possessor 
of  an  antique  foot,  valued  by  Nollekens  as  highly  as 
any  specimen  in  his  collection  ;  of  which  precious 
relic  he  has  been  heard  to  tell  the  following  story. 
When  he  was  at  Home,  he  often  endeavoured  to 
persuade  Cardinal  Albani,  to  whom  it  belonged,  to 

1  George  III.— Ed. 


400  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

part  with  it,  but  without  success.  At  last,  when 
Nollekens  was  about  to  come  to  England,  the 
Cardinal,  who  knew  no  other  way  of  getting 
possession  of  a  female  torso,  which  Nollekens 
possessed,  gave  him  the  foot  for  it. 

It  has  also  been  stated  that  the  Cardinal  stole  the 
foot  in  order  to  give  it  to  Nollekens  ;  and  some, 
who  stick  at  nothing,  have  said  that  Nollekens  stole 
it  from  the  Cardinal.  This,  however,  I  do  not 
believe,  as  I  never  will  encourage  the  thought  of 
his  being  dishonest,  or  even  in  the  slightest  degree 
dishonourable.  It  is  now  kept  by  Sir  Thomas 
Lawrence,  under  a  glass  shade  ;  and  it  must  have 
measured  one  foot  five  inches  and  a  quarter  from 
the  heel  to  the  great  toe,  before  the  tip  of  that 
member  was  mutilated.  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence, 
when  first  he  acquired  it,  was  inclined  to  consider 
it  as  belonging  to  the  famous  torso,  the  marble 
being  the  same,  and  the  proportions  agreeing  most 
perfectly  ;  but,  upon  a  little  reflection,  the  president 
gave  up  that  pleasing  idea,  perfectly  satisfied  that 
it  never  could  have  belonged  to  that  fragment,  as 
the  foot  treads  flat  upon  the  ground,  and  is  un- 
questionably in  the  action  of  a  standing  figure 
about  to  walk,  which  does  not  accord  with  the 
action  of  the  thighs  of  the  torso,  which,  the  reader 
will  recollect,  is  seated. 

I  was  the  means  of  Sir  Thomas  acquiring  another 
interesting  relique  of  art,  as  will  appear  by  the 
following  statement. 

Twelve  months  after  the  death  of  Dr.  Fryer  I 
found,  by  a  catalogue  of  his  household  property, 


THE  THRONE-CHAIR  OF  REYNOLDS  aoi 

that  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds'  throne-chair  was  inserted 
for  sale  by  auction  ;  and  though  I  had  many  friends 
who  were  ignorant  of  that  circumstance,  and  whose 
love  for  the  arts  would  have  induced  them  to  have 
gone  to  a  high  price  for  it,  particularly  one  gentle- 
man of  rank  and  fortune,  from  whom  I  and  my 
family  have  received  repeated  instances  of  kind- 
ness, I  considered  it  my  duty,  as  an  artist,  to 
apprise  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence  of  its  approaching 
exposition  ;  and,  for  that  proper  attention,  I  had 
the  honour  of  receiving  his  warmest  thanks.  How- 
ever, on  the  day  of  sale,  the  president  had  nearly 
lost  it,  as  the  lot  was  actually  about  to  be  knocked 
down  for  the  paltry  sum  of  10s.  6d.  just  as  the 
rescuing  bidder  entered  the  room  ;  which  enabled 
him,  after  a  slight  contest  of  biddings,  to  place  the 
treasure  on  that  very  day  by  Sir  Thomas's  fireside 
in  Russell  Square. 

Last  year,1  in  the  ever- memorable  sale  of  the 
Leicester  Gallery  of  Pictures,  consisting  entirely  of 
the  productions  of  British  artists,  a  comparatively 
diminutive  chair  of  French  character  was  con- 
spicuously advertised  as  the  throne -chair  of  Sir 
Joshua  Reynolds.  Sir  Thomas  Lawrence,  as  soon 
as  possible,  personally  acquainted  Mr.  Christie  with 
the  absurd  mistake,  who,  upon  coming  to  the  lot, 
with  his  usual  manly  fairness,  acknowledged  the 
error  to  the  whole  company,  informing  them  that 
the  real  unostentatious  chair  was  in  the  possession 
of  the  President  of  the  Royal  Academy. 

Some  time  before  Dr.  Fryer's  death  I  requested 

1  That  is,  in  1827.— Ed. 

26 


402  NOLLE  KENS  AND  HLS  TIMES 

him  to  give  me  a  specimen  of  Barry's  handwriting 
to  insert  in  Boswell's  '  Life  of  Dr.  Johnson,'  which 
my  wife  has  for  several  years  been  engaged  in 
illustrating  ;  when  he  most  liberally  gave  me  that 
artist's  first  sketch  of  the  letter  which  he  addressed 
to  Lord  and  Lady  Inchiquin  upon  their  honouring 
him  with  the  presentation  of  the  above-mentioned 
chair.  And  as  many  of  my  readers  may  not  be  in 
possession  of  Dr.  Fryer's  '  Life  of  Barry,'  where 
the  perfect  letter  is  inserted,  I  here  give  a  copy  of 
the  first  confused  draught  which  now  adorns  my 
wife's  book  : 

'  Mr.  Barry  presents  his  respectful  compliments  to  Lord  and  Lady 
Inchiquin,  with  every  acknowledgment  and  thanks  for  their  in- 
estimable favour  conferred  on  him  this  morning,  in  the  gift  of  Sir 
Joshua's  chair. 

'  Alas !  this  chair,  that  has  had  such  a  glorious  career  of  fortune, 
instrumental  as  it  has  been  in  giving  the  most  advantageous  stability 
to  the  otherwise  fleeting,  perishable  graces  of  a  Lady  Sarah  Bunbury, 
or  a  Waldegrave,  or  in  perpetuating  the  negligent,  honest  exterior  of 
the  authors  of  the  "  Rambler,"  the  "  Traveller,"  and  of  almost  every- 
one whom  the  public  admiration  gave  a  currency  for  abilities,  beauty, 
rank,  or  fashion  :  the  very  chair  that  is  immortalized  in  Mrs.  Siddons' 
tragic  muse,  where  it  will  have  as  much  celebrity  as  the  chair  of 
Pindar,  which  for  so  many  ages  was  shown  in  the  Porch  at  Olympia. 

'This  chair,  then,  of  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  may  rest,  very  well 
satisfied  with  the  reputation  it  has  gained  ;  and  although  its  present 
possessor  may  not  be  enabled  to  grace  it  with  any  new  ornament,  yet 
it  can  surely  count  upon  finding  a  most  affectionate,  reverential  con- 
servator, whilst  God  shall  permit  it  to  remain  under  his  care.5 
'Jan.  30,  1794. 
1  No.  36,  Castle-street,  Oxford-market.' 

The  next  record  which  I  shall  insert  concerning 
Mr.  Nollekens  is  a  list  of  his  principal  perform- 
ances, which  I  have  arranged  alphabetically,  in 
order  that  the  reader  may  readily  find  the  bust, 
statue,  or  monument  of  any  particular  individual : 


BUSTS 


403 


BUSTS. 


A. 
Aberdeen,  Lord 
Ackland,  Miss 
Adam,  Mr. 

Alban's,  Duchess  of  St. 
Andover,  Lady 
■^Anson,1  Hon.  Thomas 
Argyle,  Duchess  of 
Arkwright,  Mr. 
Arkwright,  Mrs. 
Asaph,  Bishop  of 
Aubyn,  Sir  John  St. 
Aubyn,  Lady  St. 
Auckland,  Miss 
Aufrere,  Mr. 
Aylesford,  Lady 


Baillie,  Doctor 

Banks,  Sir  Joseph 

Bathurst,2  Lord  Chancellor 

Beaufort,  Duchess  of 
^Bedford,  Duke  of 

Bedford,  John  Duke  of 

Bedford,  Duchess  of 

Barrington,  Lord 

Berwick,  Lady 
*Besborough,  Lord 


Bolton,  Duke  of 

Borrows,  Master 
*Bradell,  Mrs. 

Brook,  Lord 

Brownlow,  Lord 

Brownlow,  Lady 

Brownlow,  Lady 
*Burney,  Admiral 
*Burney,  M.  D. 
*Burney,  Rev.  Doctor 

C. 
^Canning,  Hon.  George 

Carlisle,  Lord 

Carr,  Mr.  John 

Castlereagh,  Lord 

Cavendish,  Lord  Frederic 
■^Cavendish,  Lord  George 

Chambers,  Doctor 

Charles  II.,  King  of  Eng- 
land 

Chatham,  Lord 
*Charlemont,  Lord 

Charlemont,3  Lady 

Clair,  Miss  Le 

Coke,  Mr. 

Colpoys,  Admiral 

Coote,  Sir  Eyre 


1  Mr.  Deville,  of  the  Strand,  having  purchased  of  Mr.  Goblet,  Mr. 
Nollekens'  principal  assistant,  the  moulds  of  those  busts  marked  with 
a  (*),  the  reader  will  be  gratified  by  knowing  that  casts  of  them  may 
now  be  had  at  a  very  reasonable  rate. — Smith. 

2  This  bust  is  in  the  Registrar's  room  of  the  Six  Clerks'  Office, 
Chancery  Lane.  In  the  committee- room,  under  the  same  roof,  is  a 
whole-length  portrait  of  the  same  Chancellor  in  his  robes,  by  Dance, 
which  has  been  severely  cut  at  the  lower  part  of  the  picture. — Smith. 

3  I  have  heard  Northcote  declare  that,  in  his  opinion,  the  bust  of 
Lady  Charlemont  is  the  finest  of  Nollekens'  productions,  and,  indeed, 
that  he  considered  it  equal  to  any  antique. — Smith. 


404 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


Cornelli,  Mrs. 
Coutts,  Mr. 
*Cowper,  Lord 
Cromwell,  Oliver 
Cumberland,    His     R.     H. 
William  Duke  of 

D. 

Darnley,  Lord 
*Daruley,  Lady 
Dashwood,  Mr.  Bateman 
Denison,  Mr. 
Devonshire,  Duke  of 
Dillon,  Lord 
Donegal,  Marquis 
Dorset,  Duke  of 
Drummond,  Provost1 
Dunning,  Mr. 
Dysart,  Lady 

E. 
Ellis,  Mrs. 
*Erskine,  Lord 


Farr,  Hon.  Edward 
Finch,  Mr.  Thomas 
*Fitzpatrick,  General 
Fitzwilliam,  Lord 
Foley,  Mr. 
Folkes,  Lady 

Fox,  Hon.  Charles  James2 
Fraine,  Mr. 
Fraser,  Simon 

G. 
*George  III.,  King  of  Eng- 
land 
^Gainsborough,  Lord 

Garrick,  Mr.  David 

Gower,  Lord 

Gower,  Lord  G.  L. 
*Gower,  Lady 

Gordon,  Duke  of3 

Goldsmith,  Oliver 

Grafton,  Duke  of 


1  George  Drummond,  so  often  Provost  of  Edinburgh,  ranks  very 
high  among  the  benefactors  to  the  Royal  Infirmary  in  that  city.  In 
memory  of  its  obligations,  a  bust  of  him  has  been  placed  in  the  hall. 
It  was  done  by  Nollekens,  and  bears  the  highly  complimentary  in- 
scription of  'George  Drummond,  to  whom  his  country  is  indebted 
for  all  the  benefits  which  it  derives  from  the  Royal  Infirmary ' 
('History  of  Edinburgh).' — Smith. 

2  It  is  said  that  the  Empress  Catherine  of  Russia  placed  Fox's  bust 
by  Nollekens  between  those  of  Cicero  and  Demosthenes.  She  had 
no  fewer  than  twelve  busts  of  Mr.  Fox  in  marble,  all  executed  by 
Nollekens,  to  give  as  presents. — Smith. 

'  To  the  memory  of  Charles  James  Fox,'  written  by  Mr.  Roscoe, 
under  a  bust  of  him  by  Nollekens,  in  a  temple  erected  to  his  memory 
upon  the  banks  of  the  Clyde  by  Mr.  Todd,  of  Glasgow. 

'  Champion  of  Freedom  !  whose  exalted  mind 
Grasp'd  at  the  general  good  of  human  kind  ! 
Patriot !  whose  view  could  stretch  from  pole  to  pole, 
And,  whilst  he  bless'd  his  country,  loved  the  whole  !' — Smith. 

3  This  bust  of  the  Duke  of  Gordon  is  considered  one  of  Nollekens' 
finest  works. — Smith. 


BUSTS 


405 


*Granby,  Marquis 

Levi,  Moses 

*Grenville,  Lord 

Lee,  Mr. 

*Greville,  Hon.  Thomas 

"^Liverpool,  Lord 

Grey,  Lord 

Liverpool,  Lady 

Gregory,  Mr. 

Lucan,    the    Daughter    of 

*Gwydir,  Lord 

Lord 

H. 

M. 

Hamilton,  Mr. 

Madox,  Mr. 

Harringdon,  Mr. 

Malone,  Anthony 

Hawkesbury,  Lady 

*Mansfield,  Lord 

Heartley,  Lady  Louisa 

Mansolini,    Anna,    at    Bo- 

^Helen's, Lord  St. 

logna 

Hillesbury,  Lord 

Manners,  Lady 

Holford,  Mr.  Robert 

Mathias,  Mr. 

^Holland,  Lord 

Marchant,  Master 

Howard,  the  Hon.  Mrs.; 

Maud,  Mr. 

Howard,  Mrs. 

Maud,  Mrs. 

J. 

Meath,  Bishop 

*Milton,  Lord 

Johnson,  Bishop 

Mitford,  Master 

*Johnson,  Doctor1 

Moira,  Lord 

Jersey,  Lord 

Monck,  Lady  Elizabeth 

K. 

Montagu,  Mr. 

*Mulgrave,  Lord 

Keate,  George 

Keith,  Lord 

N. 

Key,  Rev.  Mr. 

Neal,  General 

Keebel,  Mr. 

♦Newcastle,  Duke  of 

King,  Admiral 

Newborough,  Lord 

Kirby,  Mrs. 

Newborough,  Lady 

L. 

North,  Hon.  Dudley 

Lake,  Lord 

0. 

Lauderdale,  Lord 

Orme,  Robert 

1  At  Nollekens5  sale,  Mr.  Chantrey  requested  me  to  bid  for  the 
first  cast  of  this  head  of  Dr.  Johnson.  Upon  my  asking  him  how  far 
he  would  go  for  it,  he  observed,  '  You  buy  it,  for  I  shall  think  it  cheap 
at  any  price  ;  as  it  is,  in  my  opinion,  by  far  the  finest  head  our  friend 
ever  produced ' ;  and,  indeed,  it  seemed  to  be  considered  so  by  another 
bidder,  who  made  me  pay  ten  guineas  for  it — almost  four  times  the 
money  Nollekens  charged  for  the  common  casts. — Smith. 


406 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


P. 

Paoli,  General 

Parr,  Count 

Peranesi,  J.  B. 

Pelham,  Hon.  Mr. 

Pelham,  Hon.  Mrs. 
*Perceval,  Hon.  Spencer1 

Percy,  Lord 

Petre,  Lord 
*Pitt,  Hon.  William2 

Popham,  Mr. 

Pringle,  Sir  John 

R. 

Richards,  Mr. 
Richards,  Mr.  John 
Roberts,  Doctor 
Robinson,  Sir  William 
Robinson,  Sir  Sept. 
Rockingham,  Marquis  of 
Ross,  Lord 
Rutland,  Duke  of 
Rutland,  Duchess  of 
Rutland,   Duchess   of,   Isa- 
bella 
Russia,  Empress  of 

S. 
Salesbury,  Lady 
Saville,  Sir  George 
Simmonds,      Daughter     of 

Mr. 
Somerset,  Duke  of 


Spencer,  Lord 

Spencer,  Lord  Robert 

Stanhope,  Sir  William 

Stafford,  Marquis  of 
*Sterne,  Rev.  Laurence 

Stonor,  Mr. 

Stroonlof,  General 

Stuart,  Lord  Henry 

Stuart,  Sir  John 

Sykes,  Sir  Christopher 
T. 
*Taylor,  Mr. 

Townley,  Mr.  Charles 

Townley,  Mr.  John 

Trevor,  Bishop 

Tulmarsh,  Mr. 

W. 

*Wales,    His    Royal   High- 
ness Prince  of 
*Wales,    Her    Royal    High- 
ness Princess  of 

Waddell,  Mr.  William 
"^Warwick,  Lord 

Welch,  Mr.  Saunders 

Welch,  Mrs.,  wife    to    the 
above 

Wellesley,  Marquis 
*Wellesley,  Hon.  Pole 
*Wellesley,  Hon.  William 
*  Wellington,  Duke  of 

West,  B.  P.  R.  A. 
*Whitbread,  Samuel 


1  In  a  letter  by  Nollekens,  dated  November  27,  1812,  with  which 
I  have  lately  been  favoured  by  the  Rev.  Henry  Crowe,  of  Bath,  to 
whom  it  is  addressed,  it  is  stated  that  his  price  for  a  bust  in  marble 
was  then  one  hundred  and  fifty  guineas  ;  to  which  he  adds  that  he 
had  at  that  time  orders  for  fifteen  busts  of  Mr.  Perceval  at  that  price. 
— Smith. 

2  The  busts  of  Pitt  and  Fox,  according  to  the  theatrical  phrase, 
were  called  '  Nollekens'  stock  pieces,'  for  they  were  always  in  requisi- 
tion.— Smith. 


MONUMENTS 


Woodburne,  Colonel 
*Wyndham,  Hon.  William 


Woodhouse,  Mr. 


*Wynne,  Sir  W.  W. 
William      III.,      King 
England 


of 


407 


Y. 

*York,  His  Royal  Highness 

Duke  of 
York,    Her     Royal    High- 
ness Duchess  of 


MONUMENTS  EXECUTED 

A. 
Ashburton,  Lord 

B. 

Bathurst,  Lord 
Barwell,  Henry 
Bateman,  Lord 
Baring,  John 
Besborough,  Lord 
Boston,  Lord 
Boscawen,  Mr. 
Birch,  Taylor 
Bod  well,  Mr. 
Booth,  Sir  Charles 
Boyn,  Lady 
Boyde,  Lady 
Buck  worth,  Mr. 


Coke,  Mrs.1 
Champion,  Major 
Chase,  Mr. 
Cunliffe,  Sir  Foster 


BY  MR.  NOLLEKENS. 
D. 

Darby,  Mrs. 
Dashwood,  Sir  John 
Davenport 
Dorset,  Duke  of 
Dysart,  Lord 

E. 
Earl,  Mrs. 
Elwes,  Mr. 

F. 
Finch,  Rev.  Dr. 
Fuller,  John 

G. 

Goldsmith,  Oliver 

H. 
Howard,  Mrs.2 
Hill,  Joseph 

I. 

Irwin,  Lady 
Irby,  Mrs. 


1  This  monument  cost  about  £2,000.  The  whole  of  the  figures 
were  carved  by  Goblet. — Smith. 

2  It  has  been  roundly  asserted  that  Nollekens  took  the  composition 
of  this  monument  from  that  erected  to  the  Cardinal  Richelieu.  Be 
this  as  it  may,  the  figure  of  the  child  alone  is  equal  to  anything 
ancient  or  modern,  and  the  praise  bestowed  on  that  Nollekens  is  un- 
equivocally entitled  to.  The  figure  of  Religion  in  this  monument  was 
carved  by  Goblet. — Smith. 


408 


NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 


J. 

R. 

Jervoise,  Mrs. 

Robinson,  Sir  Sept. 

K. 

S. 

Keate,  George 

Kent,  H.E.H.  Duke  of 

Salesbury,  Sir  Thomas 
Sand,  Lord 

L. 

Leigh,  Lord 
Long,  Charles1 
Lovaine,  Lord 

M. 

Mackenzie,  Stewart 

Standish,  Mr. 

Sayer,  Admiral 
Southell,  Edward 
Seymour,  Lady  Anne 
Spencer,  Earl 
Shipley,  Mrs.2 
Stuart,  Sir  Charles 

Manners,  Lord  Robert 
Mitford,  Mrs. 
Mordant,  Sir  J. 
Mortman,  Mr. 
Mynell 

T. 
Talbot,  Lady 
Trevers,  Lord 
Tyrell,  Sir  J. 

N. 

W. 

Noel,  General 

P. 

Pinfold,  Sir  Thomas 

Willis,  Dr.  Robert 
Wyndham,  William 
Wyndham,  Family 
Worcester,  Bishop 

Pringle,  Sir  John 

Wynn,  Lady 

1  This  monument,  consisting  of  a  boy  with  an  inverted  torch,  was 
erected  at  Saxmundham  :  for  a  notice  and  drawing  of  which  I  have 
been  obliged  to  the  Rev.  John  Mitford,  editor  of  an  edition  of  Gray's 
Works,  published  in  1814.  —Smith. 

2  The  wife  of  the  late  Bishop  of  St.  Asaph,  who  was  a  brother  of 
Shipley,  the  drawing-master  of  the  Strand,  where  Nollekens  went  to 
draw  of  an  evening  when  a  boy. — Smith. 

William  Shipley  was  the  founder  of  the  famous  St.  Martin's  Lane 
Academy,  the  best  drawing-school  in  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century.     He  was  born  in  1714,  and  survived  until  1803. — Ed. 


STATUES  409 


STATUES  EXECUTED  BY  MR.  NOLLEKENS  IN  MARBLE. 

Denison,  Robert    .    .     . 


} 


Denison,  William 

Diana Marquis  of  Rockingham. 

Juno Ditto. 

Mercury Lord  Yarborough. 

Pitt,  Hon.  William Senate  House,  Cambridge. 

Rockingham,  Marquis  of .     .     .  Earl  Fitzwilliam. 

Venus1 Marquis  of  Rockingham. 

Venus  chiding  Cupid2 ....  Lord  Yarborough. 

Venus Mr.  Chamberlayne,  Hampshire. 

Venus  anointing  her  hair     .     .  Bought    at     Mr.     Nollekens' 

auction  by  Mrs.  Palmer. 

Among  the  few  chimney-pieces  executed  by  Mr. 
Nollekens,  one  of  a  superior  kind  was  sent  to 
Edinburgh  for  Mr.  Scott. 

Mr.  Nollekens  also  executed  five  masks  upon 
keystones  for  Somerset  House,  after  drawings 
made  purposely  by  Mr.  Cipriani.  He  likewise 
executed  orders  of  a  very  inferior  kind,  by  putting 
them  out  to  be  done  by  the  masons  of  the  New 
Road  ;  the  profits  of  which  were  not  inconsiderable, 
as  he  never  gave  them  more  than  a  quarter  of  what 
he  charged  himself. 

1  A  noble  lord,  when  viewing  Mr.  Nollekens'  statue  of  Venus  per- 
fuming her  hair,  asked  the  artist  from  whence  he  took  the  idea  of 
thus  employing  her.  Surely  it  must  have  been  from  Homer  ?  Nollekens 
made  no  reply  ;  in  fact,  he  knew  very  little  of  Homer. — Smith. 

2  Nollekens  was  so  provoked  by  an  accident  which  happened  to  one 
of  his  figures  during  the  exhibition  at  Somerset  House  that  he 
threatened  F.  M.  NewtoD,  the  secretary,  who  made  light  of  the  affair, 
should  this  Venus  be  in  any  way  injured,  to  break  every  bone  in  his 
skin. — Smith. 


410  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

As  the  manner  in  which  every  man  of  talent 
advances  in  his  art  is  interesting  to  the  inquiring 
mind,  I  have  extracted  from  a  set  of  the  Royal 
Academy  Exhibition  Catalogues  the  subjects  pro- 
duced by  Mr.  Nollekens  as  they  stand  chrono- 
logically : 

No.  1771. 

139.  A  bust  of  a  nobleman  in  marble. 

140.  A  model  of  Bacchus. 

141.  A  ditto,  Pastus  and  Arria,  a  group. 

1772. 

168.  A  bust  of  a  gentleman,  in  marble. 

169.  A  statue  of  Bacchus,  ditto.1 

177a 

211.  A  statue  in  marble,  representing  Venus  taking  off  her  sandal. 

212.  Cupid  and  Psyche,  in  basso-relievo. 

213.  Hope  leaning  on  an  urn. 

214.  Portrait  of  a  young  lady. 

1774. 
190.  A  bust  of  his  Majesty,  in  marble. 

1775. 

208.  A  bust  of  a  nobleman,  in  marble. 

209.  Venus  chiding  Cupid,  a  model. 

210.  A  bust,  ditto. 

1776. 

199.  A  statue  of  Juno,  in  marble. 

200.  A  bust,  ditto. 

201.  A  bust,  in  marble. 

202.  A  ditto. 

1777. 

249.  A  bust  of  a  nobleman,  in  marble. 

250.  Ditto  of  a  gentleman  ,  ditto. 

251.  Ditto  ditto        ditto. 

1  The  original  beautiful  little  model  from  which  this  statue  was 
carved  is  in  the  possession  of  my  friend  John  Gawler  Bridge,  Esq. 
— Smith. 


MISCELLANEOUS  WORKS  411 

252.  A  bust  of  a  gentleman,  in  marble. 

253.  Ditto  of  a  lady,  a  model. 

254.  Ditto  of  a  gentleman,  ditto. 

1778. 

216.  A  marble  group  of  Venus  chiding  Cupid. 

217.  A  statue  of  Diana. 

218.  A  model  of  two  children,  designed  for  a  monument. 

219.  A  bust  of  a  gentleman. 

1779. 

217.  A  bust  of  a  nobleman,  in  marble. 

218.  Ditto  of  a  general. 

219.  A  model  of  a  monumental  figure. 

1782. 

529.  A  monumental  bas-relievo. 

535.  A  figure  of  Adonis. 

556.  A  Cupid  sharpening  his  arrow. 

1783. 
464.  Figure  of  Mercury,  in  marble. 

1784. 

497.  Bust  of  a  lady. 

498.  Bust  of  a  nobleman. 
520.  Bust  of  a  lady. 


635.  Busto  of  a  gentleman. 


1785. 
1788. 


597.  A  monumental  figure. 
605.  A  monumental  figure. 
647.  Figure  of  Britannia. 

1789. 
605.  Bust  of  a  gentleman.       0 

1790. 

660.  Lord  Robert  Manners  expiring  in  the  arms  of  Victory,  in- 
tended by  the  late  Duke  of  Rutland  for  a  monument  to  be 
placed  in  the  chapel  at  Bel  voir  Castle. 

1791. 

632.  Bust  of  a  gentleman. 

633.  Bust  of  a  lady. 


412  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

1792. 
498.  A  bust  of  a  lady. 

1793. 
585.  Bust  of  a  lady. 
652.  Bust  of  a  gentleman. 

1799. 

622.  Bust  of  a  lady  of  quality. 
933.  Bust  of  a  nobleman. 
940.  Bust  of  a  lady. 
951.  Bust  of  a  nobleman. 
961.  Bust  of  a  nobleman. 
972.  A  Venus. 

1800. 

988.  Bust  of  a  gentleman. 

989.  Bust  of  a  nobleman. 
1031.  Venus  anointing  her  hair. 

1082.  A  monumental  group,  to  the  memory  of  a  lady  who  died  in 
child-bed,  supported  by  Religion. 

1801. 

999.  Portrait  of  Mr.  John  Townley,  in  the  form  of  a  Terminus. 

1001.  Bust  of  his  Grace  the  Duke  of  Bedford. 

1002.  Bust  of  a  young  gentleman. 

1007.  A  bust  of  Lady  Hawkesbury. 

1008.  Bust  of  a  young  gentleman. 

1009.  Bust  of  Lord  Petre. 

1024.  A  sepulchral  bas-relief  to  the  memory  of  the  late  Duke  of 
Dorset. 

1802. 

1059.  Bust  of  Dr.  Burney, 

1063.  A  design  for  a  monument  to  the  memory  of  a  late  celebrated 

general,  supported  by  Wisdom  and  Justice. 

1064.  A  sketch :  The  Graces. 

1065.  Bust  of  the  late  Duke  of  Bedford. 

1066.  A  sketch :  Adam  and  Eve. 

1067.  A  sketch  of  a  monument  for  a  naval  officer  expiring  in  the 

arms  of  Victory. 

1073.  Bust  of  the  Hon.  C.  J.  Fox. 

1074.  A  sketch  :  The  Slaughter  of  the  Innocents. 


MISCELLANEOUS  WORKS  413 

1803. 

924.  Pudicity  :  a  sketch. 

925.  Bust  of  Mr.  Stonor. 

930.  Lot  and  his  two  Daughters :  a  sketch. 

931.  Dsedal us  and  Icarus :  a  sketch. 

932.  The  Judgment  of  Paris  :  a  sketch. 
1024.  Bust  of  Lord  Moira. 

1804. 

947.  Portrait  of  the  Hon.  C.  Grey. 

948.  Portrait  of  Miss  C.  Symmons. 

949.  Portrait  of  the  Right  Hon.  General  Fitzpatrick. 

950.  Portrait  of  the  Earl  of  Lauderdale. 

951.  Portrait  of  Lord  R.  Spencer. 

1805. 

689.  A  sketch  of  a  Hercules. 

690.  A  sketch  of  a  Faun  playing. 

693.  A  medallion  of    the  late  Miss  Ackland,   daughter  of    J. 

Ackland,  Esq. 

694.  A  sketch  of  Laocoon  and  his  Sons. 

695.  A  bust  of  the  Marquis  of  Stafford. 

711.  A  design  of  a  monument,  intended  for  Westminster  Abbey, 

to  the  memory  of  two  naval  officers, 
783.  A  bust  of  the  late  C.  Townley,  Esq. 
789.  A  bust  of  T.  W.  Coke,  Esq. 

1808. 

969.  Bust  of  the  Hon.  Mr.  Pelham. 

970.  Bust  of  the  Earl  of  Darnley. 

971.  Bust  of  the  Marquis  Wellesley. 

972.  Bust  of  his  Grace  the  Duke  of  Bedford. 

978.  Bust  of  his  Royal  Highness  the  Prince  of  Wales. 

979.  Bust  of  Sir  W.  W.  Wynne,  Bart. 

1810. 

753.  His  Grace  the  Duke  of  Rutland. 

766.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Brownlow. 

874.  Bust  of  the  Hon.  Mrs.  Pelham. 

875.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Grenville. 

876.  Bust  of  her  Grace  the  Duchess  of  Rutland. 

885.  Bust  of  the  Countess  of  Charlemont. 

886.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Mulgrave. 


414  NOLLEKENS  AND  HIS  TIMES 

1811. 
926.  A  model  of  a  monument  of  the  late  Mrs.  Coke,  of  Holkham. 
938.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Castlereagh. 

940.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Earl  of  Chatham. 

941.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Grenville  Leveson  Gower. 

948.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  W.  Wellesley  Pole. 

949.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Roos. 

951.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  George  Canning. 

952.  Bust  of  Admiral  Sir  J.  Colpoys,  K.B. 

1812. 

933.  Bust  of  the  Countess  of  Charlemont.1 

934.  Bust    of    Benjamin    West,    Esq.,   President    of    the   Royal 

Academy. 

936.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  Brooke. 

937.  Bust  of  Lord  Gwydir. 

1813. 

919.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Spencer  Perceval. 

925.  Bust  of  the  Right  Hon.  Lord  G.  Cavendish. 

926.  Bust  of  H.R.H.  the  Duke  of  York. 

935.  Bust  of  the  Marquis  of  Wellington. 

1814. 

781.  Bust  of  S.  Whitbread,  Esq.,  M.P. 

789.  Bust  of  the  Earl  of  Charlemont. 

792.  Bust  of  his  Grace  the  Duke  of  Grafton. 

800.  Bust  of  Earl  Cowper. 

801.  Bust  of  the  Earl  of  Aberdeen. 

1815. 

888.  Bust  of  Lord  Erskine. 

889.  Bust  of  the  Rev.  C.  Burney,  D.D. 
895.  Bust  of  the  Earl  of  Egremont. 

1816. 
932.  Bust  of  Lord  St.  Helen's. 

950.  Bust  of  T.  Coutts,  Esq. 

951.  Bust  of  the  Earl  of  Liverpool. 

961.  Bust  of  his  Grace  the  Duke  of  Newcastle. 

1  In  order  to  account  for  the  recurrence  of  the  same  bust,  it  may  be 
proper  to  remark  that  Mr.  Nollekens  in  many  instances  exhibited  the 
model  one  year,  and  a  carving  from  it  in  marble  in  the  next. — Smith. 


THE  END  415 


Such,  and  so  numerous,  are  the  works  of  Nolle- 
kens,  who  will  long  be  remembered,  not  only  as 
having  held  a  conspicuous  rank  among  contem- 
porary artists  in  an  era  abounding  in  men  of  genius, 
but  as  having,  by  assiduity  rarely  surpassed,  and 
parsimony  seldom  equalled,  amassed  a  princely 
fortune  ;  from  which,  however,  his  avaricious  spirit 
forbade  him  to  derive  any  comfort  or  dignity, 
excepting  the  poor  consolation  of  being  surrounded, 
in  his  dotage,  by  parasites  who  administered  to  his 
unintellectual  enjoyments,  and  flattered  even  his 
infirmities,  in  the  hope  of  sharing  the  vast  property 
which  Death  would  force  him  to  resign. 


[417] 


APPENDIX 

Since  the  greater  part  of  this  volume  was  in  print,  Miss 
Edith  M.  Beechey,  of  High  House,  Newbury,  the  grand- 
daughter of  Sir  William  Beechey,  R.A.,  who  was  one  of 
Nollekens'  executors,  has  obliged  me  with  the  sight  of  a 
dossier  of  French  and  Flemish  documents,  only  lately 
discovered  among  the  family  papers,  which  throw  some 
small  further  light  on  the  genealogy  of  the  sculptor. 

It  appears  from  them  that,  on  learning  of  the  death  of 
Nollekens  in  London,  an  attorney  of  Louvain,  M.  Joseph 
Emmanuel  Bals,  discovered  certain  collateral  heirs  of  the 
sculptor's  great-grandfather,  and  supposing  Nollekens  to 
have  died  intestate,  proceeded  to  bring  their  names  under 
the  notice  of  the  Court  of  Chancery.  This  attempt,  of 
course,  was  promptly  shown  to  be  absurd,  and  the  corre- 
spondence has  little  value,  except  as  a  further  proof  of  the 
extreme  accuracy  of  J.  T.  Smith.  It  adds,  however,  a 
few  family  facts.  It  carries  the  genealogy  of  the  sculptor 
one  generation  further  back,  and  reveals  a  great-grand- 
father, Henry  Nollekens,  who  on  July  15,  1660,  married 
Marie  Anne  de  Baghedette  de  Rinckt,  at  Antwerp.  This 
Henry  had  two  sons,  the  younger  being  the  sculptor's 
grandfather ;  the  elder,  Henry  Nollekens,  born  at  Antwerp 
on  February  14,  1663,  married  Barbe  van  den  Casteelen, 
and  became  the  father  of  Cathrine  and  Paul  Nollekens  ; 
of  these  the  former,  marrying  Francois  Meulemans,  became 
the  mother  of  Jean  Baptiste  Meulemans,  while  Paul  became 

27 


418  APPENDIX 


the  father  of  Jean  Baptiste  and  Francis  Nollekens.  These 
were  the  three  pretendents  whom  Bals  brought  forward, 
and  they  were  all  elderly  men  at  the  time,  Jean  Baptiste 
Nollekens  being  over  eighty.  They  all  belonged  to  the 
labouring  class. 

The  claim  of  these  cousins  falling  through,  Bals  made 
another  attempt — one  fails  to  see  why — to  disturb  the  will 
on  the  ground  that  the  sculptor's  father,  Old  Nollekens, 
who  had  called  himself  Joseph  Francis,  and  had  been 
buried  under  that  name,  when  he  died  in  Paddington,  on 
January  21,  1748,  was  an  illegitimate  son.  At  first  it 
seemed  as  though  this  must  be  true,  for  no  child  of  that 
name  had  been  baptized  at  Antwerp  between  1690  and 
1730.  It  was  found,  however,  that  he  had  adopted  the 
name  Joseph.  The  father  of  the  sculptor,  then,  legitimate 
son  of  Jean  Baptiste  Nollekens,  and  born  at  Antwerp  on 
June  10,  1702,  was  Corneille  Francois  Nollekens,  and  it 
was  under  that  name  that  he  married  Marie  Anne  Le  Sacq, 
the  mother  of  the  sculptor. 

One  small  additional  fact  is  brought  to  light  by  this 
correspondence,  namely,  that  Old  Nollekens  studied  under 
Giovanni  Paolo  Panini,  the  Italian  painter.  The  name  of 
his  mother,  the  grandmother  of  the  sculptor,  was  Anne 
Angeline  Le  Roux,  who  was  buried  at  Antwerp  on  Sep- 
tember 30,  1747. 

E.  G. 


t  419  ] 


INDEX 


Abbott,  Francis  Lemuel,  96 

Academy,  Royal,  first  sculptors,  2,  8, 
9  ;  first  gold  medal,  9  ;  keepers,  6,  8, 
78,  151  ;  first  secretary,  40  ;  Nolle- 
kens  elected,  40  ;  earliest  professor 
of  painting,  69 

'Achilles  Arming,'  Banks,  15 

Adam,  Robert,  the  architect,  17,  285 

Albani,  Cardinal,  225,  399 

Alefounder,  John,  341 

Alexander,  William,  24 

Antique  forgeries,  107,  108 

Antique  sculpture,  Nollekens'  treat- 
ment, 37,  222,  396 

Architects  in  eighteenth  century,  3 

Argyle  Street,  252 

Arminger,  William,  76,  121 

Arnald,  George,  A.R.A.,  37,  326 

Arnald,  Sebastian  Wyndham,  37 

Artificial  Stone  Factory,  Lambeth,  9, 
10 

Ashbourne,  Derbyshire,  15 

Bacon,  John,  R.A.,  1  ;  career,  9  ; 
character  and  success,  10,  11  ;  skill, 
11,  12  ;  and  George  III.,  90,  91 

Baddeley,  the  actor,  194 

Bailey,  Edward  Hodges,  R.  A.,  246,  304 

Baillie,  Captain,  141 

Bailye,  Rev.  Canon  H.,  135 

Baker,  John,  51 

Balme,  Rev.  Edward,  365,  368,  373 

Banks,  Sir  Joseph,  228 

Banks,  Thomas,  R.  A.,  birth  and  educa- 
tion, 13  ;  career,  14,  15  ;  '  Every 
Man  in  his  Way,'  72 

Bannister,  Charles,  120,  121,  148 

Bannister,  John,  194 

Baptiste,  flower-painter,  62 

Barber,  Francis,  135 

Barnard,  John,  299 


Barry,  James,  R.A.,  34,  35,  66f  105, 
161,  253,  327,  401 

Bartolozzi,  Francesco,  R.A.,  22 

Bat  Pidgeon,  of  the  Strand,  304,  305 

Bathurst,  Lord  Chancellor,  73 

Beaumont,  Sir  George,  137 

Beechey,  Sir  William,  R.A.,  328,  339, 
345,  363,  366,  373,  375,  417 

Beefsteak  Club,  125 

Bell,  Rev.  Dr.,  164 

Bensley,  the  printer,  134 
1    Bentham,  William,  56 
J    Bessborough,  Earl  of,  38,  118,  119 

Betew,  Paton,  173-177,  178 
J    Bethlehem  Hospital,  20,  213 

Bird,  Francis,  1,  167,  182,  389 
i    Birdcage  Walk,  229 
I   Bishopsgate  Street,  213 

Bolt  Court  (Dr.  Johnson's),  134 

Bonomi,  Joseph,  A.R.A.,  63,  256,  276, 
289,  322,  337,  338 
I   Bonomi,  Family  of,  bequest,  366 
I    Booth,  bookseller,  55 
I    Boothby  monument,  Banks',  15 
j    Borsi,  Dr. ,  of  Rome,  250 
;    Boswell,  James,  128,  130,  204,  216 
I    Bourgeois,    Sir    Francis,    R.A.,    326, 

339 
!    Bow  Churchyard,  9 
I    Bow  manufactory,  176 
I    British  Museum,  print-keepers,  24,  25, 
83  ;  Townley  marbles,  36,  230  ;  Lord 
Exeter's  drawings,  223 

Britton,  Tom,  193 

Bromley,  herald-painter,  49 

Brompton,  Richard,  310 

Brooking,  Charles,  175 

Browne,  George  H.,  303 

Brownlow.     See  Exeter,  Earl  of 

Burney,  Dr.  Charles,  61,  116,  151 

Busby's  monument,  167 


420 


INDEX 


Byrne,  William,  279 
Byrne,  Mrs.,  367 

Canova,  A,  18,  250 

Capizzoldi,  5,  48 

Capon,  William,  217 

Carlini,  Agostino,   R.A.,    2,    5,   6,    8, 

151 
Carlisle,  Sir  Anthony,  365,  370 
Carlisle  Street,  Soho,  8 
Carter,  Mrs.  Elizabeth,  77,  84,  85,  120, 

186-89,  287 
Carter,  John,  164 
Carter,  Thomas,  18,  168 
Catherine  of  Russia,  14,  404 
Catling,  John,  163 
Catton,  Charles,  R.A.,  50 
Cave,  E.,  205 

Cecil,  biographer  of  Bacon,  1 
Ceracchi,  Giuseppe,  17 
Chambers,  Sir  William,  R.A.,  104 
Chambers,  Lady,  48,  188 
Chantry,  Sir  Francis,  R.A.,  16,  182, 
233,  240,  245,   265,  276,  335,  386, 
405 
Charlemont,  Lady,  bust,  403 
Charles  Street,  Westminster,  51 
Charlotte,    Queen,    83,    84,    155,    296, 
323 

Chatelaine,  J.  B.  C,  174 

Chatham's  monument,  Bacon,  12,  16 

Cheer e,  Sir  Henry,  leaden  figures,  85, 
249 

Chelsea  china  designers,  177 

Cheney,  Bartholomew,  168 

Chesterfield's  letters,  80 

Chippendale,  Thomas,  196 

Christie,  the  auctioneer,  65,  234,  285, 
368,  375,  395,  401 

Church  Court,  Covent  Garden,  52 

Cibber,  Caius  Gabriel,  214 

Cipriani,  Giovanni  Baptista,  R.A.,   5, 
48,  182,  183,  184,  231,  316,  409 

Clarkson,  Nathaniel,  50 

Coates,  "Francis,  R.A.,  death,  82 

Cockpit,  The  Royal,  235 

Coleman,  Miss,  201 

Coleraine,  Lord,  218,  219 

Cook,  F.,  149 

Cooke,  'Memory,'  53 

Cooper,  Richard,  senior,  279 

Coote,   Sir    Eyre,   monument,    Banks, 
14,  15  ;  bust,  Nollekens,  140 

Cornwall's  monument,  Cheney,  168 

Cosway,     Richard,    R.A.,     134,    306, 
367 

Cosway,  Mrs.  Maria,  134,  295 


Coutts,  Mrs.  (afterwards  Duchess  of 
St.  Albans),  386,  387 

Coutts,  the  banker,  385,  387 

Covent  Garden  :  Lord  Russell's  house. 
54 ;  Robins'  rooms,  58  ;  debased 
period,  132, 133  ;  Low's  Hotel,  187  ; 
flowers  first  sold,  187  ;  famous  resi- 
dents, 197-99 

Cranbourne  Alley,  130 

Cranmer,  Charles,  model,  83 

Craven  buildings,  Drury  Lane,  78 

Crispe,  of  Bow  Churchyard,  9 

Crone,  Robert,  239,  299 

Crowther,  of  Bow,  176 

Cunningham,  Allan,  1,  3,  16 

Dallaway,  Rev.  James,  170 

Dalton,  Richard,  88,  239 

Darner,  Hon.  Anne,  17 

Dance -Holland,  Sir  Nathaniel,   R.A., 

49,  151,  152,  187,  249,  336 
Darley,  Matthew,  318 
Dawkins,  James,  388 
Dean  Street,  62 
Deare,  John,   17,   18,  181,    221,   222, 

361,  388 
Delvaux,  Laurent,  2,  3 
Delvaux,  junior,  121 
Desenfans,  Noel,  325,  326 
Devay,  Abbe,  228 

Deville,  of  the  Strand,  333,  394,  403 
Devins,  Miss  S.,  367 
Devonshire  Place,  56 
Dibdin,  Charles,  214 
Dixon,  John,  149,  151 
Dodd,  '  Little,'  148 
Dogs,  Anecdotes  of,  153,  154,  156,  160 
Douce,  Francis,  366,  368,  375 
Dress  (ladies')  in  1771,  42,  43 
Drummond,  George,  404 
Dulwich  Gallery,  326 
Dundas,  Sir  Thomas,  285 
Dutch  tables,  241 

Eckstein,  John,  168 

Edmonton,  23 

Egremont's,    Earl,    Petworth    gallery, 

246,  327,  398 
Eldon,  Lord,  56 
Elgin    marbles,    230,    242,  256,    322  ; 

House  of  Commons  committee,  257-6 
Elgin's,  Lord,  house,  256 
Evans,  of  Pall  Mall,  65,  396 
Exeter,  Earl  of,  223 

Fagan's  drawings,  222 
'Falling  Giant,'  Banks,  15 


INDEX 


421 


Fashions  in  1771,  43,  44  ;  account  by 

Miss  Moser,  79 
Ferg,  Francis  Paul,  177 
Fiamingo's  models,  388 
Fielding,  Henry,  41,  42  ;  anecdotes  of, 

126-28;  Man  of  the  Hill  in  'Tom 

Jones,' 177,  391 
Fielding,  Sir  John,  125,  132 
Fifing  boys,  287 
Flaxman,   John,   R.A.,  1,  10,  17,   20, 

112,   148,  168,   223,  246,  257,  267, 

301,  313,  350,  359,  361,  385,  399; 

evidence  on  Elgin  marbles,  259-64 
Fleet  prisoners'  money-box,  65 
Foley  Place,  48 
Ford,  Richard,  138 
Fountain's  school,  56 
Fox,  Charles  James,  308,  393,  404,  406 
French  Gardens,  93 
Frogmore,  83 
Fryer,  Dr.,  400,  401,  402 
Fuseli,    Henry,   R.A.,    80,    102,    161, 

216,  217,  321,  385 

Gahagan,  George,  367 

Gahagan,  Sebastian,  121,  289,  332,  367, 

380,  381 
Gainsborough,  81, 170, 172,173, 175,  309 
Garrard,  George,  324 
Garrick.  David,  22,  33.   49,   81,   148, 

149,   151,   152,    154,   188,   196,  236, 

283,  293 
Garrick,    Mrs.,    151,     155  ;     her    dog 

Biddy,  154 
Garter,  insignia  of  the  Order,  152 
Gatehouse,  Westminster,  169 
Gaugain,  T.,  394 
Gee,  Mrs.  Elizabeth,  371 
George  III.,  birthplace,  170  ;  and  Nol- 

lekens,    88-91  ;    Mr.    Townley  and, 

229  ;  Rebecca  and,  316 
Gerrard,  Mrs.,  367 
Gerrard,  Miss,  337 
Gerrard  Street,  23,  76 
Gibbons,  Grinling,  54 
Gibson,  John,  R.A.,  322 
Gifford,  Mr.,  205 
Gilliland,  Thomas,  285 
Goblet,  Alexander,  290,  303,  356,  364, 

365,  367,  368,  371,  372,  407 
Goblet,  Henry,  37?,  373 
Goblet,  Louisa,  367 
Go-cart  for  infants,  211-13 
Golden  Square,  83 
Goldsmith,    Oliver  ('the  Professor   of 

History'),  81,    284;    monument   in 

Westminster  Abbey,  76 


Goupy,  Joseph,  45 

Gower  Street,  55,  56 

Graham,  Mrs.,  147 

Grand  Junction  Canal  fetes,  319,  320 

Grassini,  the  singer,  252 

Gray,  Thomas,  136 

Great  Portland  Street,  21,  47,  48 

Great  Queen  Street,  196,  197 

Great  Russell  Street,  Covent  Garden, 

399 
Green,  a  sculptor,  121 
Green,  Mrs.,  366 
Gribelin,  184 
Grignon,  Charles,  188 
Grignon,  Thomas,  50,  78, 125, 176,  299 
Grosvenor  Square,  59,  197 

Haid,  Johann,  150 
Halifax  monument,  Bacon,  12 
Hamilton,  Colonel,  172,  173 
Hamilton,  Gavin,  81, 172,  222,  316,  323 
Hampstead,  Upper  Flask  Tavern,  86  ; 

salubrity  and  residences,  111-13 
Hampton,  155 
Handel,  G.  F.,  56 

Hanger,  Colonel  George.    See  Coleraine 
Hawkins,  Sir  John,  129,  130, 135,  201  ; 

1  History  of  Music,'  193 
Hawkins,  Mrs.,  368 
Hawkins,   Miss,    110,    116,    129;    her 

anecdotes,  205-208 
Hayman,  Frank,  R.A.,  99,  103,  236 
Henning,  John,  268,  387,  388 
Hill,  Aaron,  300 
Hilton,  William,  R.A.,  151 
Hinchliffe,  Right  Rev.  Dr.,  23 
Hoadly,  Dr.  John,  236 
Hoare,  Mr.  Prince,  250,  300 
Hoare,  William,  R.A.,  206 
Hogarth,  William,  45,   60,  66,  68,  148, 

178,  179,  235,  236,  247,  278,  392 
Holmes,  Admiral,  monument  by  Wil- 
ton, 6 
Holt,  Mrs.  Mary,  353,  358,  367,  373 
Hone,  Horace,  143 
Hone,  Nathaniel,  R.A.,enamellist,  140, 

141,  176;  exhibition  of   'Conjuror,' 

142-47  ;  death,  147 
Hone's  '  Every-day  Book,'  197 
Hoole,  John,  196 
Horn,  Count,  84 

Hornick,  Mrs.,  and  daughters,  81 
Howard,  Mrs.,  monument,  Nollekens, 

407 
Hoyle,  E., '  Whist,'  44 
Hudson,  Thomas,  58,  196,  318 
Hussey,  Mrs.,  127,  128 


422 


INDEX 


Hutton,  Dr.,  205 

Ireland,  Samuel,  191 

•  Ixion  on  the  Wheel,'  Procter,  18 

Jackson,  John,  R.A.,  336 

James  Street,  Covent  Garden,  188 

Jenkins,  antique  dealer,  37,  222,  299 

Jennings,  Noel,  254,  255 

Jernigan,  Henry,  299 

John  Street,  St.  Pancras,  294 

Johnson,  Dr.  Samuel,  22,  42,  71,  76, 
82,  92,  104,  105,  118,  121,  128,  130, 
134-36,  203,  207,  236,  251,  288,  291, 
292 ;  bust,  390,  405  ;  Bolt  Court 
house,  134 

Joseph,  G.  F.,  A.R.A.,  91,  286 

Joseph,  Samuel,  91 

Julien,  Pierre,  5 

Kauffman,  Mrs.  Angelica,  R.A.,  77, 
81,  83,  100,  141,  142-46,  310,  316, 
388  ;  first  marriage,  84,  249  ;  death, 
250 

Kean,  Edmund,  341 

Kean,  Moses,  340,  341 

Keate,  George,  153 

Kerrick,  Rev.  Thomas,  290,  366,  371, 
374,  381 

King,  Colonel  Richard,  61 

Kitchiner,  Dr.  William,  192,  193 

Kneller,  Sir  Godfrey,  197,  391,  392 

Knight,  Richard  Payne,  52,  83 

Knowles,  John,  385 

Lake,  Sir  James,  23,  176 
Lambert,  George,  125 
Langford,  the  auctioneer,  58 
Lawrence,  Sir  Thomas,  R.A. ,  85,  162, 

185,  257,  265,  350,  360,  390,  400,  401 
Le  Beck,  the  cook,  127 
Lee,  Mary,  C.  Whiteford's  widow,  365, 

366 
Leicester  Fields,  60,  133,  182 
Leicester  Gallery  of  Pictures,  401 
Lely,  Sir  Peter,  197 
Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  197 
Litchfield  Street,  131 
Liverpool  Street,  213 
Lloyd,   Mrs.  Mary,  R.A.,   77-83,    102, 

120,  280,  289,  291,  292,  293,  308  ;  will, 

294,  295 
Locke,  William,  of  Norbury,  37 
London  street-cries,  192-96 
Lonsdale,  James,  384 
Loutherbourg,  Philip  James  de,  R.A., 

112,  120 


Lowe,  T.,  singer,  56,  120 
Lupton,  George,  367,  381 

McArdell,  James,  211 
Macpherson,  Sir  John,  286 
Mansfield,  Lord,  118,  207,  243,  344 
Martin,  Rev.  Mr.,  104 
Marylebone  Church,  41  ;  Fields,    133, 

218,  255  ;  Gardens,  56,  133 
May  Day  dances,  115 
Mendoza,  373 
Mengs,  Raffaelle,  278 
Meyer,  Jeremiah,  R.A.,  86 
Michael  Angelo,  360 
Monamy,  Peter,  49 
Monmouth  House,  Soho  Square,  53 
Montague,  Lady  Mary  Wortley,  198 
Monuments  by  Nollekens,  catalogue  of, 

407,  408 
Morland,  George,  49 
Mortimer,  John  Hamilton,  A.R.A.,  52 
Mortimer  Street,  40,  93,  365 
Moser,  George  Michael,  R.A.,  77,  78, 

151,  176 
Moser,  Joseph,  294 
Moser,  Mary,  R.A.     See  Lloyd,  Mrs. 

Mary 
Mosman,  Nicholas,  222-24 

Newborough,  Lady,  331 

Newman  Street,  320 

New  Road  masons,  409 

Newspapers,  Old,  66-8 

Newton,  Francis  M.,  R.A.,  40,  145, 
409 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  60 

Nichols,  Mr.  Deputy,  205 

Nollekens,  Henry,  417 

Nollekens,  Joseph,  R.A.,  15-17,  24 ; 
pedigree,  29,  30,  417,  418;  early 
masters,  31  ;  Society  of  Arts  pre- 
miums, 32,  33 ;  in  Rome,  33-9  ; 
patronized  by  Garrick,  33  ;  by 
Sterne,  34  ;  wins  Papal  medal,  ib.  ; 
Barry's  friendship,  34,  35  ;  antique 
dealings,  35,  36,  37,  38  ;  smuggling 
in  busts,  39 ;  Mortimer  Street 
house,  40;  elected  R.A.,  ib.  ;  royal 
patronage,  ib.,  88,  90  ;  marries 
Mary  Welch,  41-4  ;  J.  T.  Smith  in 
studio,  57  ;  mother,  66 ;  eccentricities, 
72-5,  220,  221  ;  person,  95,  96,  150, 
218  ;  dinner-parties,  98-103  ;  anti- 
pathy to  Romney,  102 ;  domestic 
jars,  110,  117,  224-26  ;  father-in- 
law's  legacy,  130 ;  conversations, 
163-171,   174-77  ;  on  colossal  sculp- 


INDEX 


423 


ture,  180  ;  at  Academy  Club  and 
Harrogate,  199-201  ;  a  Venus  model, 
201,  202  ;  coarseness,  227  ;  merits  as  a 
sculptor,  241,  363,  389,  393  ;  love  of 
Italian  Opera,  252  ;  orthography, 
253  ;  on  Elgin  marbles,  257-59  ;  in. 
contrast  with  Flaxman,  267  ;  house 
robbed,  274,  275;  studio  and  gallery, 
276  ;  bereavement,  289  ;  Mary 
Lloyd's  executor,  294  ;  habits,  296, 
297  ;  fits  of  generosity,  304,  335,  344  ; 
residence,  307-11 ;  faith,  311, 312;  art 
patronage,  326,  327  ;  manners,  328, 
331  ;  insensibility  to  natural  objects, 
350  ;  meanness,  39,  353-58 ;  draw- 
ings, 358-61  ;  skill  in  modelling, 
363  ;  death,  365 ;  will,  365-73  ; 
funeral,  374-77  ;  profit  from  Pitt 
commissions,  383  ;  sale  of  effects, 
395  ;  charges,  406 ;  list  of  works, 
403-14 
Nollekens,     Old,     [Joseph]    Corneille 

Francois,  29,  80,  418 
Nollekens,  Mrs.  Joseph,  41,  42,  69-71, 
94,  95,  101,  106,  113,  129, 189,  190, 
204,  252,  280,  288,   289,    295,   311, 
386. 
Norfolk,  Duke  of,  town-house,  170 
Norman,  the  dog  doctor,  156,  157 
Northcote,  James,  R.A.,  252,  285,  300 

'  Old  Corks,'  195 
Old  newspapers,  66-8 
Opie,  John,  R.A.,  215 
Oram,  William.  112 
Ottley,  William  Young,  162 
Oxford  Market,  298 

Paddington,  14,  49,  288,  365,  376 

Palmer,  F.  R.,  368 

Pantheon,  Oxford  Street,  215,  216 

Paoli,  General,  120 

Paradice,  Mrs.,  291,  292 

Park  Lane,  Piccadilly,  256 

Park  Street,  Westminster,  227,  229-35 

Pasquin,  Anthony,  318 

Peck,  Jasper,  368,  375 

Pelham.     See  Yarb  rough 

Pennant,  Thomas,  55 

Penny,  Edward,  R.A.,  69 

Perceval,  Hon.  Spencer,  406 

Peter  Pindar.     See  Wolcot 

Pether,  Abraham,  329 

Petworth,  246,  398 

Phillips,  Lieutenant-Colonel,  61,  155 

Pigalle,  Jean  Baptiste,  47 

Pisano,  Vittorio,  270 


Pitt,  Right  Hon.  W.,  statue,  Cam- 
bridge, 380-82,  406 

Playbill  for  Marshalsea  benefit,  393 

Pocock's,  SirG.,  monument,  Bacon,  12 

Pond,  Arthur,  318 

Pope,  Alexander,  330 

Poplar,  Ea9t  India  Company's  Chapel, 
88 

Procter,  Thomas,  18,  19,  361 

Pulteney  monument,  Wilton,  6 

Queen  Anne  Street  East  (Foley  Place), 

48 
'Queen's   Head   and   Artichoke,'  218, 

254 
Queen's  Street,  Lincoln's  Inn,  49.     See 

Great  Queen's  Street 
Queen's  Square,  40 
Quellinus,  Arthur,  4 
Quin,  James,  148,  149 

Radcliffe,  Mrs.  Anne,  157-160 

Rann,  Jack  ('Sixteen-string  Jack'),  47 

Rathbone  Place,  59,  147 

Rat's  Castle,  Dyot  Street,  321 

Rawle,  the  antiquary,  31 

Read,  Nicholas,  sculptor,  6 

Rebecca,  Biagio,  A.R.A.,  316,  317, 
318 

Renton,  John,  333 

Reynolds,  Sir  Joshua,  P.R.A.,  18,  58, 
59,  76,  81,  104,  141,  147,  228,  252, 
301,  329,  330,  400,  402 

Rich,  Mr.,  125,  209 

Richardson,  George,  122 

Richardson,  Jonathan,  junior,  40,  390 

Richardson,  Samuel,  205 

Rigaud,  John  Francis,  R.A.,  184,  185 

Rijsbrack,  John  Michael,  2,  359 

Robertson,  Andrew,  334 

Robertson,  Charles,  367 

Robins,  the  auctioneer,  58 

Robinson,  Perdita,  23 

Rodney's  Captains,  monument  by  Nol- 
lekens, 16,  383 

Romney,  George,  112 

Rossi,  John  C.  F.,  R.A.,  19,  200,  246, 
336,  397,  398,  399 

Roubiliac,  L.  F.,  1,  2,  7,  21,  22,  31, 
174,  214,  240,  389,  396 

Rouw,  Peter,  373,  375 

Royal  Academy  Club,  199 

Rubens,  P.  P.,  182,  183-85,  211 

Rudeman,  Dr.,  367 

Rumsey,  Mrs.  Elizabeth,  367 

Runciman,  Alexander,  82 

Russell  Court,  Co  vent  Garden,  319 


424 


INDEX 


Russell  Square,  401 

Russell  Street,  Drury  Lane,  50,  125 

St.  George's  Church,  Bloomsbury,  129 

St.  James's  Square,  170 

St.  Martin's  Churchyard,  22 

St.    Martin's   Lane   Academy,   13,  21, 

408  ;  Hone's  pictures  147 
St.  Martin's  Street,  Leicester  Square, 

60 
St.  Paul's,  182,  244 

St.  Paul's,  Covent  Garden,  78,  198,  299 
Salmon's  Waxworks,  165 
Sancho,  Ignatius,  51,  53 
Sandby,  Paul,  R.A.,  138,  139,  175 
Sandby,  Thomas,  R.A.,  23 
Sayer,  James,  87 
Scheemakers,  Peter,  2,  22,  31,  64,  167, 

389 
Score,  William,  59 
Sculptor's  disadvantages,  243,  244 
Seward,  William,  161 
Shakespeare,  209 
Sharp,  William,  271,  293 
Sheridan,  Richard  B.,  196,  217 
Sherwin,  John  Kaye,  23,  155,  205,  206 
Shipley,  William,   drawing-school,  30, 

408 
Shuter,  Ned,  194 
Siddons,  Mrs.,  23,  382,  383 
Signs  by  well-known  artists,  49-51 
Simon,  Thomas,  181,  271 
1  Sixteen-string  Jack,'  47,  164 
Smart,  John,  308 
Smirke,  Robert,  R.A.,  49 
Smith,  Charles,  284 
Smith,  John  Thomas,  1,  21-26,  36,  37, 

99,  373 
Smith,  Nathaniel,  21,  22,  30,  32,  57, 

121 
Society  of  Arts,  9,  31,  296 
Soane,  Sir  John,  R.A.,  350 
Soho  Square,  62 
Soilleux,  John,  367 
Somerset  House  or  Place,  6,  78,  409 
'  Southwark  Fair,'  Hogarth,  236 
Spang,  M.  H.,  360 
Spilsbury,  John,  319 
Spinning-wheel  Alley,  213 
Staines,  Sir  William,  315 
State-coach  of  George  III.,  48,  49 
Statues  by  Nollekens,  catalogue  of,  409 
Steam  stage-coach,  320,  221 
Steevens,  George,  86-88,  136 
Sterne,  Laurence,  34,  39,  51 
Stewart,  an  American  artist,  336 
Stothard,  Thomas,  R.A.,  165 


Stow,  James,  172 
Strand,  304 

Strange,  Sir  Robert,  239 
Street-cries  of  London,  192-96 
Strike  of  shoemakers  in  1766,  131 
Stuart,  James  ('Athenian'),  36,  45,  60 
Sutherland,  Colonel,  55 
Symmons,  Rev.  Dr.  Charles,  367 

Tabley,  Lord  de,  The  first,  186 

Tavistock  Row,  187 

Taylor,  John,  portrait-painter,  98-100, 

i01,  289,  331,  362,  367 
Teuscher,  Marcus,  40 
Theed,  William,  R.A.,  19,  20 
Thomson,  Henry,  R.A.,  151 
Thornhaugh  Street,  296 
Thornhill,  Sir  James,  177,  197 
Thrale,  Mrs.,  118 
Thurlow,  bust  by  Rossi,  19 
Tinney,  John,  279 
Titchfield  Street,  122,  201,  215 
Townley,  Charles,  22,  36,  38,  121, 171, 

201,    227-29  ;     house    and    gallery, 

229-35,  258,  259.  313 
Townley,  John,  235,  32 1 
Townsend's  monument  in  Abbey,  168 
'  Traveller  Twiss,'  209 
Tresham,  Henry,  R.A.,  216,  321 
Tull,  Nathaniel,  175 
Turner,  J.  M.  W.,  R.A.,  304 
Twigg,  the  fruiterer,  186 

Uxbridge  Canal  excursions,  319 

Vandevelde,  William,  187 

Varley,  John,  325 

Vauxhall  Gardens,  100 

Vere  Street,  2 

Verninck,  Maria,  370 

Vertue,  George,  166 

Vestris,  Madame,  116 

Vine  Street,  2,  31,  64 

Vivares,  Thomas,  174, 175 

'  Vortigern,'  representation  of,  191, 192 

Walford,  Mrs.,  367 

Walpole,  Horace,  50 

Walton,  Parry,  184 

Ward,  Dr.,  51 

Warwick  Street,  Golden  Square,  5 

Watteau,  Antoine,  29 

Wedding-dress  of  a  lady  in  1771,  42,  43 

Welch,  Anne,  41,  129,  130,  189,  253, 

280,  292  ;  death  and  epitaph,  251 
Welch,  Saunders,  41,  48,  102, 103,  123, 

124-127,  128,  129,  30-34,  136-38,  311 


INDEX 


425 


Wellington,  Duke  of,  374,  376 

Wesley,  John,  221 

Wesley,  Samuel,  the  organist,  116, 
210  221 

West,' Benjamin,  P.K.A.,  19,  257,  295, 
316,  317,  320,  367 

Westmacott,  Richard,  R.A.,  20,  241, 
246,  264,  276 

Westminster  Abbey,  163-69,  313-15, 
389 

Westminster  Bridge,  Old,  169 

Westminster,  dress  of  the  High  Con- 
stable, 124,  125 

Whitbread,  Samuel,  248 

White,  a  fabricator  of  antiques,  108 

White's  Chocolate  House,  97 

Whitefield,  Rev.  George,  133  ;  taber- 
nacle, 11 

Whiteford,  Caleb,  102,  281-84,  310, 
365,  366 

Whitehall  ceiling,  Rubens,  182-85 

Wigs,  treatment  by  artists,  390,  391  ; 
theft  of,  392,  393 

Wilkes,  John,  125 

Wilkie,  Sir  David,  R.A.,  390 

Wilkinson,  Robert,  206 

Williams,  John,  critic,  318 

Williams,  sculptor,  397 

Wilson,  Richard,  RA.,  51,  136,  137, 
138,  139,  186,  197,  278,  310 


Wilton,  Joseph,  R.A.,  2,  3-8,  22,  48, 

104 
Winckelmann's  'Reflections,'  4 
Wivell,  Abraham,  344 
Wolcot,    Dr.    ('Peter    Pindar'),    137, 

187,  214,  215,  319 
Wolfe,  General,  monument  by  Wilton, 

5,  7,  174 
Wollaston,  Rev.  Mr.,  367 
Woodburn,  Samuel,  162 
Woodcock,  John,  367 
Woodward,  Dr.,  61 
Wodlett,  William,  279 
Worlidge,  Thomas,  196 
Wren,  Sir  Christopher,  184 
Wright,  coach-maker,  50 
Wyatt,  Richard.  23 
Wycherley,  William,  391,  393 
Wynn,  Sir  Watkin  W.,  49,  151,  152 

Yarborough,  Lord,  38,  71,  99,  395,"  396  ; 
his  daughter,  73 

Zincke,  Christian  Friedrich,  187 
Zotfany,    Johann,    R.A.,   81,    86,   149, 

228,  278,  309 
Zotfany,  Mrs.  Mary,  366,  378 
Zucchi,  Antonio,  R.A.,  84,  316.     See 

Kauffman 


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