The Life and Works of Benjamin West
Part II
Chap. I
Mr. West arrives in England.—Relative Condition of Artists in Society.—Mr. West’s American Friends in this Country.—Of Governor Hamilton and Mr. Allen,— Circumstances favourable to their Reception in the Circles of Fashion.—Mr. West’s Visit to Bath, and Excursions to see some of the Collections of Art in England.—He settles as a Portrait Painter.—Introduction to Burke and Dr. Johnson.—Anecdote of a Monk, the Brother of Mr. Burke.—Introduction to Archbishop Drummond.
—Mr West’s Marriage.
Mr. West arrived in England on the 20th of August, 1763. The sentiments with which he approached the shores of this island, were those of a stranger visiting interesting scenes, mingled with something of the solicitude and affections of a traveller returning home. He had no intention of remaining in London: he was only desirous to see the country of his ancestors, and his mind, in consequence, was more disengaged from professional feelings than at any period from that in which his genius was first awakened. He considered his visit to England as devoted to social leisure, the best kind of repose after mental exertion; but the good fortune which had hitherto attended him in so remarkable a manner, still followed him, and frustrated the intentions with which he was at that time actuated.
Those who have at all attended to what was then the state of the arts in this country, and more particularly to the relative condition of artists in society, and who can compare them with the state of both at the present period, will not hesitate to regard the arrival of Mr. West as an important event. In the sequel of this work, it may be necessary to allude to the moral and political causes which affect the progress of the fine arts, and opportunities will, in consequence, arise to show how meanly they were considered, how justly, indeed, it may be said, they were rejected, not only by the British public in general, but even by the nobility. A few eminent literary characters were sensible of their importance, and lamented the neglect to which they were consigned; but the great body of the intelligent part of the nation neither felt their influence, nor were aware of their importance to the commerce and renown of the kingdom. Artists stood, if possible, lower in the scale of society than actors; for Garrick had redeemed the profession of the latter from the degradation to which it had been consigned from the time of the Commonwealth; but Reynolds, although in high repute as a portrait-painter, and affecting a gentlemanly liberality in the style of his living, was not so eminently before the public eye as to induce any change of the same consequence towards his profession.
Mr. West found, on his arrival in London, several American families who had come across the Atlantic after the peace to visit their relations, and he had the unexpected pleasure of hearing that Mr. William Allen, Governor Hamilton, and Dr. Smith, his earliest friends and patrons, were in this country.
Mr. Allen, like many others in the colonies at that time, was both a professional man and a merchant. He held indeed the dignified office of chief justice in Pennsylvania, and was a person of powerful and extensive connections in the mother-country. Hamilton, who had been many years governor, was chiefly indebted to him for the rank which he enjoyed, in consequence of having married his sister.
The naval and military officers who had occasion, during the war, to visit Philadelphia, found in the houses of the governor and Mr. Allen a cordial hospitality which they never forgot. Many of these officers were related to persons of distinction in London, and being anxious to testify to the Americans their grateful sense of the kindness which they had experienced, rendered the strangers objects of hospitable solicitude and marked respect in the first circles of the metropolis. Mr. West, accordingly, on his arrival, participated in the advantages of their favourable reception, and before he was known as an artist, frequented the parties of several of the highest characters in the state.
His first excursion from London was to Hampton Court to see the Cartoons of Raphael. Soon after, he visited Oxford, Blenheim, and Corsham; whence he proceeded to Bath, where Mr. Allen was at that time residing. Here he remained about a month; and in returning to town made a short tour, in the course of which he inspected the collections of art at Storehead, Fonthill, Wilton House, the Cathedral of Salisbury, and the Earl of Radnor’s seat at Longford. At Reading he staid some time with his half-brother, Mr. Thomas West, the eldest son of his father. When he returned to London he was introduced by Mr. Patoune, his travelling companion from Rome, to Reynolds, and a friendship commenced between them which was only broken by death. He also, much about the same time, formed an acquaintance with Mr. Richard Wilson, the landscape painter, to whom indeed he had brought very warm letters of introduction, from some of that great artist’s friends and admirers in Italy.
The first lodgings which Mr. West occupied, in his professional capacity, were in Bedford-Street, Covent-Garden, where, when it was understood that he intended to practise, he was visited by all the artists of eminence then in London, and welcomed among them with a cordiality that reflected great honour on the generosity of their dispositions. In this house the first picture which he painted in England was executed. The subject was Angelica and Medora, which, with the Cymon and Iphiginia, painted at Rome, and a portrait of General Moncton, (who acquired so much celebrity by his heroic conduct as second in command under General Wolfe at Quebec,) by the advice of Reynolds and Wilson, he sent to the exhibition in Spring Gardens in 1764.
While he was engaged on the picture of Angelica and Medora, Dr. Markham, then Master of Westminster-School, paid him a visit and invited him to a dinner, at which he introduced him to Dr. Johnson, Mr. Burke; Mr. Chracheroide, and Mr. Dyer. On being introduced to Burke he was so much surprised by the resemblance which that gentleman bore to the chief of the Benedictine monks at Parma, that when he spoke he could scarcely persuade himself he was not the same person. This resemblance was not accidental; the Protestant orator was, indeed, the brother of the monk.
It always appeared to Mr. West that there was about Mr. Burke a degree of mystery, connected with his early life, which their long intercourse, subsequent to the introduction at Dr. Markham’s, never tended to explain. He never spoke of any companions of his boyhood, nor seemed to have any of those pleasing recollections of the heedless and harmless days of youth, which afford to most men of genius some of the finest lights and breaks of their fancy; and his writings corroborate the observation. For, although no prose writer ever wrote more like a poet than this celebrated man, his imagery is principally drawn from general nature or from art, and but rarely from any thing local or particular.
The conversation after dinner chiefly turned, on American subjects, in which Mr. Burke, as may well be supposed, took a distinguished part, and not more delighted the Artist with the rich variety and affluence of his mind, than surprised him by the correct circumstantiality of his descriptions; so much so, that he was never able to divest himself of an impression received on this occasion, that Mr. Burke had actually been in America, and visited the scenes, and been familiar with many of the places which he so minutely seemed to recollect. Upon a circumstance so singular, and so much at variance with all that has hitherto been said respecting the early history of this eminent person, it is needless to dilate. The wonder which it may excite I have no means of allaying; but I should not omit to mention here, when Mr. Burke was informed that Mr. West was a Quaker, that he observed, he had always regarded it among the most fortunate circumstances of his life, that his first preceptor was a member of the Society of Friends.
Dr. Markham in 1765 introduced Mr. West to Dr. Newton, Bishop of Bristol, Dr. Johnson, Bishop of Worcester, and Dr. Drummond, Archbishop of York. Dr. Newton engaged him to paint the Parting of Hector and Andromache, and afterwards sat to him for his portrait, in the back ground of which a sketch of this picture was introduced: and for the Bishop of Worcester he painted the Return of the Prodigal Son. The encouragement which he thus received from these eminent divines was highly creditable to their taste and liberality, and is in honourable contrast to the negligence with which all that concerned the fine arts were treated by the nobility and opulent gentry. It is, however, necessary to mention one illustrious exception. Lord Rockingham offered Mr. West a regular, permanent engagement of £700 per annum to paint historical subjects for his mansion in Yorkshire: but the Artist on consulting his friends found them unanimously of opinion, that although the prospect of encouragement which had opened to him ought to make him resolve to remain in England, he should not confine himself to the service of one patron, but trust to the public. The result of this conversation was a communication to Dr. Smith and Mr. Allen, of the attachment he had formed for the lady whom he afterwards married, and that it was his intention to return to America in order to be united to her. In consequence of this, an arrangement took place, by which the father of Mr. West came over to this country with the bride, and the marriage was solemnised on the 2d of September, 1765, in the church of St. Martin in the Fields.